Jack Wakes
by gracefultree
Summary: Jack Harkness talks about love, falling in love, and Ianto Jones. Companion piece to my story Ianto Wakes, this is Jack's perspective on meeting Ianto and their relationship up until Ianto finds himself in London, with no memories of the prior month. Jack, on the other hand, remembers just about everything.
1. Chapter 1

**Jack on Love, or... Jack Wakes**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: This is a quasi-sequel to my other story, Ianto Wakes. It's more of a parallel-story than a sequel. In it we hear some of Jack's impressions of the Ianto who kissed him on the warehouse floor after catching Myfanwy, the Ianto who fell in love with Jack as he betrayed him, who eventually came clean and ended up in London with no memories of Jack or the entire month leading up to that moment.

But first, I wanted to ask Jack a few questions about love and his opinions of it.

Enjoy!

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I believe in love at first sight.

Now, before you protest that the words "love" and "Jack Harkness" don't belong in the same sentence, we need to come to an agreement about the definition of love.

For you 21st Century lot, there's two kinds of love, maybe three. Love of family, love of friends, and romantic love. For me, there's hundreds, thousands of types of love. Every person I meet is potentially someone to love. And, no, before you snicker like that, I'm not using "love" as a synonym for "sex." You see, love is different with each person. No love is the same. And I don't know about you, but I couldn't have sex with someone without loving them just a little. It might be their laugh, or the way their skin glows in the moonlight or their opinion about religion, but there's always something.

So, let's talk about falling in love. The sudden desire to spend every moment with that new person, to get to know them, to learn everything there is to know about them. That fluttery feeling in your stomach, like butterflies, like anxiety, but softer. Love at first sight is more like that feeling of meeting someone for the first time and being utterly smitten, like you've been hit in the head with a hammer or punched in the stomach, only not so violent. You _know_, in that instant, that this person will _change your life forever_. You might not know how they'll change it, but you _know_.

But I digress.

It's unfortunate that your views of love and sex are so – distinct. Either it's the warm emotional connection of love, or the cold, clinical sexual act. Love is beautiful. Sex is ugly, something to be ashamed of, if you're not having sex with someone you love. In fact, you keep these two concepts so far apart that you call the same activity by different names if there are emotions involved. Sex is just sex if it's about physical sensations, lust, hormones, pheromones, attraction, and pleasure. If there's an emotional relationship between the parties, sex might have all the same properties I just mentioned, but it will be called "making love."

Sex can be a recreational activity. Sex can be exercise. Sex can be communication. Sex can be expressing complex feelings. It can be caring, and comfort and any number of other things. And, yes, sex can also be love. As I said, I love everyone I have sex with.

Did Jack Harkness, the king of one night stands and the casual fuck really just say he loves everyone he shags? Yes, I did. I know you don't believe me, but it's true. Sex, at its most fundamental level, is the connection between two people. And what is more beautiful than that? What's more deserving of love than that?

When I say "love," I don't mean the all-consuming "I only ever want to have sex with you for the rest of my life because monogamy is how we express love, even if humans aren't actually meant to be monogamous" feeling that might or might not last. That's what your society calls it. I don't believe in monogamy. Sure, I've done it with a few partners, but it wasn't really my thing. I did it for them, because it would make them happy, but it only made me cranky. Well, mostly. I don't actually have to be shagging more than one person at a time. I just need the option to be there if I want it. It's a difficult thing for you to understand. Most of you, anyway. There are those who are getting closer to my views. Polyamory, polygamy, pansexuality and omnisexuality. None of it quite fits me, but then again, I was born over three thousand years in the future, so I have different views on a lot of things, and sex is only one of them.

I bet you're wondering if I've ever been in love in your traditional sense. I have been. Quite a number of times, actually. More than you would imagine, given my reputation. But I actively cultivate that particular reputation so my potential partners aren't surprised when we get around to talking about things like "relationships" and "what we're doing" and "what it means that we're together" and I tell them I don't do monogamy. It always makes me happy when someone's willing to consider being with me despite that, given the hang-ups you people have about sex.

This brings us back to what I said to start all this: Love at first sight.

I've experienced that, too. Four times. I'm open to it again. It's been a very long time since I've loved someone like that, since I've loved someone so much.

The first person I loved on sight was my little brother. I was almost three, and meeting him, holding him for the first time, it changed my life. I was so proud to be a big brother! There wasn't a more loved little brother in the whole community. I would have done anything for him, which is why it hit me so hard to lose him. It wouldn't have been so bad if we'd found a body. I would have had closure. As it stands, his loss is an open wound on my heart that I've hidden so far down in my psyche that I couldn't access it if I tried.

I was twenty when I was paired off with the man I would love instantly and unconditionally until he slipped down the slope of drugs and alcohol that I wasn't willing to follow. He hurt me, in more ways than one, and I fell out of love with him. We were hot and cold, off and on, in love and out of it for many years, never together longer than a few months. That's probably what kept us together so long. (By "together," I mean "willing to sleep together when we ran into each other.") Spending five years in a time loop of two weeks where we were the only people who knew those same two weeks would repeat again and again both brought us together in new ways and destroyed any chance we had of a real relationship. Or a lasting one. I couldn't stand to be anywhere near him after that, though we hooked up for sex a few times before I left the Time Agency.

And, no, I'm not going to tell you about the Time Agency.

The third person I fell in love with at first sight was a woman named Rose. She was so beautiful! A 21st Century girl I met in London in 1941. We time travelers get around. (No, I'm not telling you about that, either.) I danced with her on top of my stolen Chula warship by the light of Big Ben and the barrage balloons. Sadly for me, she was already in love with someone else, and while that wouldn't have mattered to me, she was raised differently, and it wouldn't be ok for her. She never had a more devoted friend than I was.

It goes without saying that I fell in love with the man she loved. I fell in love with him as we bantered about sonic technology and ran from a danger that I had inadvertently released. He gave me a chance at a new life, a braver life, a life I could be proud of, that _he_ could be proud of. He abandoned me, taking Rose with him, leaving me alone with piles of dust and bodies. I'd only ever kissed them once, and it was a goodbye kiss, and we all knew it. I didn't expect to live. But Rose loved me, in her own way, and I lived and learned how to be alone again after our adventures together.

Since I've been on Earth, I've fallen in love, and been loved, but it's never been as intense as with those others. It's never consumed me. It's never been that instant connection I had with those four.

Do I want it? Sure. But it's not the kind of thing you can force.

So when I looked into his eyes for the first time, I wasn't expecting anything more than an acknowledgement of my presence or, if I was lucky, a spark of attraction. Instead, I fell in love. I fell in love, and it hit me over the head and I was lying in the grass in a park, in the middle of the night, staring up at a gorgeous young man in tight jeans that showed off his assets in all the right ways, with a sedated weevil next to me and a gash healing on my neck. Then he spoke, and if I didn't know before, I knew then that he would change my life forever.

His name is Ianto Jones.


	2. Chapter 2

**Jack Wakes**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Here we are with Jack's memories of meeting Ianto for the first time. Enjoy and please let me know what you think. Does this Jack stay in character for who he is? (We only know so much from Ianto's version, after all...) Thanks!

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There are nearly seven billion people living on Earth right now. Even if I was to live for seven billion years, I would still remember the day I met Ianto Jones. I would still remember the day we made love for the first time, even if I called it "just sex." I was lying. I knew I was lying, but I wasn't ready to admit to myself, let alone him, that I loved him already, only a mere 23 hours after meeting him. I would still remember the day he broke my heart, and the day months later that he stitched it back together again. I would still remember the day he died.

Do you know why?

I fell in love with Ianto the moment my eyes first met his. He awoke in me a passion I hadn't known I possessed. He awoke in me a desire to be a better man. He awoke in me a compassion for others I'd thought I lost long ago. He awoke in me an ability to forgive transgressions of the heart and of the soul. He awoke in me an ability to love beyond the moment, beyond the person, beyond myself and even beyond him. He awoke in me fear and sorrow and neediness I'd been hiding in the depths of my heart. He awoke in me jealousy and possessiveness and territoriality I never allowed myself with _any_ lover, let alone someone I'd just met. He awoke me to joy and tenderness and pleasure beyond anything I'd ever experienced at the hands of trained pleasure slaves in the Vegas Galaxies.

He taught me that when two people are in love, nothing can compare.

We met on a Tuesday. A weevil was loose in the park, and I went on my own to bring it in. Tosh waited for me at the Hub, while Owen and Suzie were in London sifting through the rubble of the Canary Wharf disaster. I'd spoken to the Queen, and I still had the funding I needed to monitor the Rfit. I felt confident that Owen and Suzie could deal with UNIT well enough to get the tech we needed and oversee the destruction of the remains of Cybermen and Daleks. One of us needed to stay at the Hub at all times, monitoring the internet and media, and since that was Tosh's specialty, she was that person. I remained in Cardiff as a field agent, since our Rift continued to spit out aliens and debris, despite the London Rift being closed by the Doctor. Yes, I knew it was him. I saw some of the internal camera feeds. I knew I'd not be able to make it there before he left, so I contented myself with knowing he had saved the planet yet again, though he hadn't been able to save Rose or her mother. When I had time, I would mourn them, I promised myself.

The weevil wasn't particularly smart or violent, but I was distracted, and it chewed on my neck, leaving me bleeding on the ground. It would have killed me and gotten away if not for the intervention of a stranger with a branch. A civilian. _Shit,_ I thought, before I remembered that I had retcon in my pocket. The weevil went after the civilian and I recovered enough to take it down, though not before he was scratched. Still, he was alive, which is more than I can say for many civilians who encounter weevils in the park late at night.

I forgot about him as I sedated, cuffed, and hooded the weevil, remembering his presence only when he thanked me for saving him. Still healing, I needed a moment to staunch the bleeding. _Now I'll need to retcon him for seeing me heal, _I thought regretfully. I hated having to use retcon most of the time, though my team felt I gave it out like candy. I do a lot of things I have to do when I hate doing them, because they have to be done. Responsibility is a heavy burden, as the Doctor would say.

Still, I know what it's like to have one's memory forcibly taken, and I would do my best to pass off the healing as not as bad as it looked if I could.

"No, thank you," I replied, getting my first look at him. _Gorgeous, _my mind whispered. _Delicious,_ my cock replied, jerking to life with adrenaline from the hunt and lust at the tight jeans that showed off the young man's attributes. "And you are?" I asked, adding the usual flirtation to my tone, hoping he'd respond to it. I climbed to my feet.

"Jones. Ianto Jones," he replied with a silky Welsh accent. Oh, yes, he was responding. I could smell it on the air.

I met his eyes and felt my world fall off kilter, though I didn't understand it yet. All I knew was that this man was important, that I had to do everything I could for him, and that he would change my life. The attraction alone was unusual in its strength, and my response to his voice startled me. I felt like he could melt frozen butter with that voice, and if my brain was butter, it would be oozing out my ears that very moment.

"Nice to meet you, Jones, Ianto Jones," I said, shaking his hand. It was warm and dry and a spark shot between us. "Captain Jack Harkness," I introduced myself. I noted the barest flicker of recognition and triumph in his eyes before he glanced away, down at the weevil. _What does that mean? _I thought, though I was still distracted by his scent on the breeze and promptly forgot about my question.

You might wonder about me responding to his scent. Everyone has pheromones, even you 21st Century folks, and Ianto's were _glorious!_ Not everyone smells the same, and not all pheromones work for every person, since some people are repulsed by the same ones that ensnare others, but for him, a 21st Century man with, in my experience, underdeveloped pheromones to have me breathing deep just to get another whiff of him, _that_ was exceptional. Especially since I'd been trained not to respond to them.

"Lucky escape," he commented.

"I had it under control."

He raised a skeptical eyebrow, in an expression I would come to know very well. "Think so? Looked pretty vicious," he said. He took three steps towards me and held out a hand, as if to touch me. My neck, specifically. I backed away. Couldn't let him see the extent of my non-existent wounds. "You, um, you _were_ bleeding." Implying that he could tell that I was no longer bleeding. _Double shit, _I thought. _It's not dark enough and he's a good observer._

"I've had worse from shaving," I muttered.

He took a deep breath and let it out as he spoke again, his eyes trailing back to the weevil on the ground. "Looked like a weevil to me." He turned back to me expectantly, waiting for me to confirm his assessment. Of course I couldn't.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I retorted. He didn't believe me. I'd spoken too quickly, and we both knew it. He smirked and my cock jumped again. If I didn't get out of here quickly, I'd bed him in the mud and grass, and much as I'd usually jump at such an opportunity, I had responsibilities, being the only field agent in Cardiff at the moment. I made the snap decision to deal with the weevil now and get more information on this Ianto Jones before I dealt with him. _There's time_, I convinced myself, _and Tosh can clean up any messes he might create in the meantime_. _Perhaps there's a legitimate reason he'd know about weevils? Not likely, but not unheard of, either._ "I'll take him from here," I added, grabbing the weevil and hauling it over my shoulders in a fireman's carry. "Thanks for the assistance," I said over my shoulder as I walked past him with my burden.

"Anytime," he said. Then, as if he was just thinking it, he added, "By the way, love the coat."

He was flirting, clumsily, and it amused me. I smiled to myself. Looking back, I realize that I hadn't smiled that freely in a long time. _Young and inexperienced, _my brain told me. _Eager to learn,_ my libido replied. _Willing, _my cock offered, though I disagreed. _He's just curious, _I told myself. _I don't need a neophyte in my bed, not with all that's going on, not if I'm going to have to retcon him. _

Yes, I'm a vain man, and I want my lovers, even those I bed but once, to remember me.

Settling into the driver's seat of the SUV, the sedated weevil in the boot, I pulled up a connection with Tosh at the Hub.

"Tosh? What can you find for me on Ianto Jones? He's young, mid-twenties, I'd guess. About six feet tall, dark hair, light eyes. Welsh."

Tosh laughed, a sound I loved hearing. _"Your next shag?"_ she asked through her laughter. In the background I could hear typing.

"Hardly," I replied, though the suggestion reawakened the desire for him I'm carefully locked away for later.

_"Ianto Jones is a common Welsh name, Jack. It's like John Smith here." _

"Do what you can. He knew what a weevil is."

_"Ah. Well, that makes it more pressing, doesn't it? Let's see…" _She trailed off and I listened to her type while I drove. _"Mainframe has a hit. Ianto Jones, born August 19, 1983 in Newport. He worked at Torchwood London for two years. He's one of the 27 survivors." _She paused. _"His girlfriend, Lisa Hallet, also worked there, and she's listed as missing, presumed dead. Looks like they were together most of his time there." _

I sighed. He _would_ be from Torchwood London, a group I wanted nothing to do with. I'd worked hard over the last few years to sever my ties with them, and now that Yvonne and almost all of the employees were dead or missing and presumed dead, I had hoped I'd be rid of them. "What did he do there?" I asked. "He's pretty young."

_"Junior Researcher," _she reported. _"It's just about the lowest position you can have in the Archives Division, right under Intern. He was an intern for six months before being promoted to junior researcher, and according to his personnel file, he's in-line for a promotion at his next review, which would have been around now." _

"Hmm, can you print out his file for me?"

_"You think you'll see him again? If he's Torchwood, he's already signed the Official Secrets Act, so he won't be telling people about the weevil." _

"He was flirting with me, and he arrived just in the nick of time to help me. I suspect he wants a job and has no idea how to contact me since you blocked server access. I'm sure he's heard of my reputation and thinks flirting or sleeping with me will be a way to get his way in."

_"Then he doesn't know you half as well as he thinks he does," _Tosh commented. _"You never sleep with your employees!" _

"True, Tosh, true. He _is _cute, though. Maybe I'd be able to convince him to be a fuck-buddy instead."

_"You're awful!" _Tosh giggled, a much rarer sound than her laughter. I loved hearing it. She didn't giggle nearly often enough.

"Just saying what I'd prefer," I replied with a grin I knew she could hear in my voice. Off all the members of my team, she's the only one I considered a friend at that time, and she knew me in ways the others didn't. Not that she knew about my immortality, but she kept some of my secrets and could read my emotions when I let her. "It's been a while since I've had a steady lover."

_"I'm sorry to disappoint, Jack, but his file only mentions relationships with women." _

"Like that's ever stopped me before!" I answered gleefully, already excited about the possibility of getting Ianto into my bed. She giggled again. "And may I remind you that _he_ was flirting with _me_?"


	3. Chapter 3

**Jack Wakes, Chapter 3**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Thank you for following and reviewing! Here's the next installment. Enjoy!

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I spent two hours memorizing all the information Tosh was able to find me on Ianto Jones, then another few doing some digging of my own. There wasn't much to find, but I found what was available. I discovered that during Ianto's requisite psych testing for his job at Torchwood London he was given markers for depression, anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder. He was also rated as a low-level empath. Low enough that he couldn't be trained, according to them, though I doubted that. In my opinion, _everyone_ with _any_ level of psychic powers beyond the norm could, and _should_, be trained.

That he had depression and anxiety didn't bother me. With his past of an abusive father, an emotionally absent (and mentally ill) mother, and being raised by a sister he rarely saw anymore, I'd be more concerned if he weren't depressed or anxious. Depression ran in his family, anyway. The obsessiveness concerned me. How did it manifest? What did it mean? Was it a "run of the mill" cleanliness OCD, or something more specific and therefor potentially dangerous? I'd have to find out. If it was just an inclination for cleanliness and order, I wouldn't be worried. If it were the entire disorder, with compulsions and an inability to function normally, well, that would be a different issue.

I dug deeper.

The abuse was never recognized officially, and he was never taken into care, but there was at least one broken bone as a child that looked suspicious enough for reports to be filed. His sister was now married with two children, living nearby. I checked CCTV feeds near her house and saw Ianto arriving back there thirty minutes after I left the park.

OK, I knew where he was staying. That was good.

There were no psychiatric records _anywhere_. This means that either he never saw anyone for the mental health issues Torchwood picked up upon immediately during the three hour long intake interview, or his records had been erased. If they'd been erased, he either knew someone very good, or he was very good himself. I checked his school records and found them lacking in detail. Again, someone must have gone through them to erase them. "Able but not exceptional," the records said. Ha! Like I'd believe that. Torchwood London wouldn't have hired him if he were just "able." Something was being hidden.

I called in a favor and got one of my contacts to acquire hard-copies of his school records. It would take a day or two, but I'd have them. I called in a second favor to see if I could get psychiatric records. That might take an entire week, this contact said. I still wanted the information. I left a note for Tosh to dig deeper into the Torchwood database. They had fail-safes to keep deleted data, she had told me once, and I planned on finding everything I could.

Next I searched his credit and bank records, now that I knew a little more about him. Nothing out of the ordinary for a man his age. Actually, scratch that. He had an investment account that he monitored regularly. It wasn't large, but it was growing steadily. He was a planner. That probably went along with the OCD. Depressed people didn't tend to plan for the future, because they didn't expect to be around or because they didn't think things would get better, but obsessive people did, _just in case._ Perhaps it's good that the obsessive side was stronger than the depressive side. I wondered how losing his girlfriend would impact his mental health. Would I need to find him a therapist like UNIT and I were arranging for the other survivors? It had only been a few days, and already one had killed himself and three others were in locked psychiatric units.

Oh, and it looks like he'd bought an engagement ring for his girlfriend two months ago. Shit. If they were engaged, the emotional fallout of her death would hit him harder than if they were just dating.

It was looking less and less likely that I would get him into bed, no matter what his pheromones were saying earlier. I decided to content myself with the memory of his scent and shut down my computer. Morning had broken while I researched him, and it was time for coffee. I might not need to sleep very often, but I lived on caffeine, when I could get it. The military hammered _that_ into my brain. Take what you need when you can, otherwise, be prepared to go without. The same went for food and sex, of course.

I grabbed my coat and went to the lift to the defunct tourist office. The better of the two nearby coffee shops was closer to that door rather than off the Plass and the invisible lift. I forgot to check the CCTV before I left the tourist office, so I was surprised to see one Ianto Jones standing out there waiting for me. I repressed the scowl that threatened. Didn't he know it was rude to accost people before coffee?

Of course, if he wanted sex then I'd take him up on it, coffee or no coffee. The man was gorgeous, and I already knew I wanted him in my bed.

Last night he looked like a regular young man dressed in a dark jacket and jeans. This morning he looked like a rent boy, or what he thought a rent boy should look like. White shirt open at the collar to reveal a cute necklace and a smattering of dark chest hair and creamy skin. His jeans were even tighter than the night before, if possible.

_Willing! _my cock shouted at me. It didn't know many words, but the ones it did know... it used well and often. _He wants me, _my libido cried, and as I drank him in with my eyes, I had to agree. Unlike the hesitation last night, the calculated flirting as I walked away, this outfit was a come-hither like none I'd seen in a long time from someone who wasn't at a club looking for a quick shag. _Where is he going with this? _I asked myself silently. _I hope it's towards my bed. _

"Morning," he said cheerfully, and I had to resist smiling back at him. "Coffee?"

_You read my mind,_ I thought, accepting the cup and taking a sip after a brief hesitation. A small part of me wondered if there was more to him than meets the eye. Why would he find me so quickly, otherwise? How would he knew where to find me? What did someone from Torchwood London want with me, anyway? Was the shoe about to drop?

Still, I couldn't help but exclaim over the coffee. It melted in my mouth with a richness of flavor I'd never known coffee could have. "Wow!" I handed to cup back to him, waiting to find out his real agenda. (I knew it couldn't just be about bringing me a coffee, much as that thought pained my ego.)

"I want to work for you," he declared.

I knew it. The shoe dropped. It wasn't about sex or coffee. It was about a job I didn't have to offer him, and wouldn't offer him before I knew more about him. I still had at least a week before my second source got back to me with psychiatric records, and there was no way I'd even _consider_ hiring him without the full dossier on who he was. I declined his request.

He practically begged to work for me, offering to work without pay. Alarms sounded in my head. This kid was dangerous. No one, and I mean _no one_, would offer to work for nothing if they weren't desperate, and I have more than enough experience with desperation, both mine and other people's. I didn't need that kind of hassle. Not on my team, and not in my bed. Well, maybe in my bed. It might be really hot...

_You want him,_ my traitorous libido whispered. _You won't hire him because you want him. You hired Tosh, and she was desperate to save her mother, to get away from UNIT. You hired Owen when he was desperate after losing Katie and everyone thought grief had driven him mad. The only difference is that you didn't want to shag them. _

When he grabbed my shoulder to turn me around, and then, later, when he put his hand on my chest to stop me from walking away, I felt the spark of desire like a lightning bolt.

Yes, I wanted him. _God_, I wanted him.

There was no way I could offer him a job now, not and keep my principles. Admittedly, they were a lot looser than most people's, but I'd had more than enough of office romances in my time, and none had been with a subordinate. Thanks to Lucia, there were lines I wasn't willing to cross again, and sleeping with a coworker had become one such line.

_So don't give him a job and just fuck him,_ my libido told me. _You'll enjoy it, he'll enjoy it. It's a win-win situation. _

His parting comment about my coat, less calculated than before but still recognizably distant from true flirting, reminded me I needed time to make a decision, either way. Sleep with him or hire him?

I knew what my body wanted, and as I analyzed my heart, I got the same answer. _He could be the stability I need, _I remember thinking. _He could be the port in the storm, the hearth to come home to, the outside person who knows Torchwood, that I can talk to, who won't betray my secrets but will understand the stress of my job. He could be my lover, a real lover, not just someone to take to bed every now and then. _

_He could be very good for me, and I, in turn, could be very good for him. I'd take care of him, make sure he had a nice place to live, free time, money, anything he wants, as long as he'd be there for me when I needed a shoulder to cry on after a long day of difficult choices I didn't want to make. I could help him get over his grief, his pain. I'd make sure he got therapy if he needs it, doctor's visits, whatever else. _

_I'd love him so much more than he can imagine being loved, _I thought, startling myself, not knowing where that came from. But it was there, in my head, in my heart, waiting to be let out.

_I could easily love that man, if only he gives me a chance. _


	4. Chapter 4

**Jack Wakes, Chapter 4**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: I haven't gotten many reviews for the last two chapters. Is it not as interesting as Ianto Wakes? Do people still want to read it? (Sorry, insecure moment there.)

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Ianto followed me everywhere that entire day. I don't know how he did it, but everywhere I went, there he was, asking for a job, flirting, looking delectable. It was making me mad. I didn't want to have to deal with him and his obsessiveness right now. I had a memorial to plan, thanks to Yvonne's carelessness. I had survivors to look after. Cover stories to create. Of course, he was one of the survivors, but I didn't want to actually have to know them. I wanted them to be numbers and names on a sheet of paper, and he was making that distinctly difficult.

Mind you, the non-stop fantasies going through my head didn't help, either, and I spent the entire day half-hard. And when I wasn't fantasizing about sex, I was fantasizing about what it would be like to be his lover, to have him in my life as my support, as my partner, as my _equal_.

As much as a 21st Century man could _be_ my equal, coming from the future as I did.

Now, you might wonder how I could hold that fantasy in my head even as I rejected him. I've spent hundreds of years developing an ability to hold two (or more) conflicting thoughts or feelings in my mind at the same time. And I'm very good at shutting away feelings that would get in the way of me doing my job. It's the only way I can do what needs to get done, sometimes. The only way I can function. How else would I have been able to give away _children_ to aliens back in the 60's? They picked me to do it because they thought I didn't care, but the truth of the matter is that I didn't let myself care while I did it, then broke down afterwards. The guilt still haunts me, the shame of doing it. But I keep it locked away in a far part of my head. I'd be unable to function, otherwise, given all the things I've been compelled to do.

But back to Ianto. That day, I fantasized about sex with him. I imagined what it would be like to kiss him, to caress him, to peel layers of clothing off as I peeled away layers of control to get down to his real emotions, his passion. I imagined taking him on satin sheets under the moonlight with nothing but ourselves to concern us. I knew that he was conflicted about his desire. That much was clear. And if he's mourning his girlfriend and feeling attracted to me… well, 21st Century morals would tell him he's wrong to feel that way, that it's a betrayal of her to want me so soon after her death.

And he _did_ want me. The pheromones were clear on that.

At the coffee shop he told me he'd make me the best coffee I'd ever tasted each morning and whenever I wanted it if only I'd hire him. And since he'd already demonstrated his skills in that area, I actually paused and considered for the briefest of moments, the coffee shop's slightly overboiled offering in my hands. I reined myself in and walked away.

At the cafe he offered to do all my errands for me, so that I wouldn't have to go out to pick up lunch unless I wanted to. He promised to get my order correct every time, to anticipate when I'd need chips in addition to the sandwich or pizza.

At a tech retrieval site he informed me that he would keep our kit stocked, since he noticed that I'd run out of specimen bags. He's very organized, he said, and he would make sure we had any supplies we needed on hand. Stationary, weapons, food, everything.

At the underground garage he said he'd do all the driving, day or night. He stressed the word "night," drawing out the word with his Welsh vowels. I think he'd figured out by then that I loved the accent. He would make sure we got everywhere we needed to be on time, early, in fact, with coffee. He was beginning to convince me, especially since he handed me a full Thermos of his amazing coffee. I couldn't help but drink it.

Each time he confronted me, I told him to leave me alone, that I didn't need his help, and that there was no place for him on my team. I wasn't ready to tell him that I wouldn't hire him because I wanted sex, or whatever else my heart told me I wanted that I studiously pretended not to think about. Nor was I ready tell him I knew that his records had been altered and I was waiting for the real ones to appear in my hand. Around six I finally managed to escape him by leaving the SUV and heading out on foot into an area of the city he probably wouldn't like hanging around to see my first contact.

Someone had altered his records, that's for sure. He had an eidetic memory, a huge asset for an archivist or researcher. Torchwood London would have considered hiring him just for that. He was young enough, right out of university, to be trained, indoctrinated in their ways. I rolled my eyes at Yvonne's tactics in hiring him for the Archive Division. He'd remember every single thing he read, so his usefulness would increase each year, though his pay packet might not.

In terms of primary and secondary school, his grades plunged after his mother's death, when he started getting into trouble in the streets, but after an arrest for shoplifting and what I assumed was a beating from his father that landed him in hospital for two days, his grades picked up again. I doubted that he'd stopped stealing, though. That likely didn't change until he moved to London after his father's death for university, when he got his first bank account and deposited several thousand pounds more than his inheritance. There was no unaccounted money after that, and it seemed he settled down into a life of short-term jobs to support his education until he finished university and was hired by Torchwood. Hmm, having someone accomplished at pickpocketing might be an asset to my team… but, no, I wasn't seriously considering him for that. I had other, more — _interesting_ — positions for him…

I thanked (and paid) my contact and left the pub, searching for a way to scratch the itch my libido had become. Usually I could keep it under control, but today was something else. I knew where to go to find what I needed. The so far missing in action that night Ianto Jones wouldn't keep me from my desires, and I didn't want his mystery anyway, no matter how sexy his ass and accent. Or so I told myself as I crossed the street towards a likely candidate.

I got the call that there was Rift activity just as I finished explaining to the young, dark-haired Welsh prostitute that he would be "Ianto" for the next hour while I fucked him. Needless to say, I didn't get my fuck.

Damn, but Ianto was under my skin!


	5. Chapter 5

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 5**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Thank you all for the support for last chapter! I was feeling low, but now I'm feeling so much more confident. What great readers I have! ;-) Now we get into the story where "Ianto Wakes" essentially starts - the warehouse scene. Enjoy!

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For the first time all day, I was exactly where I wanted to be: On my back with Ianto Jones lying on top of me, our erections grinding together, his lips a hair's breath away from mine and our eyes locked in an erotic dance. The only thing that could have made the moment better was if we were naked. _And_ if we were in a bed, but beggars couldn't be choosers, and I knew that I'd get him into a bed after the first frantic fuck on the floor of the warehouse that his eyes were demanding of me. His body language was _screaming _"fuck me."

Our mutual desire now clear, all I needed was that final go-ahead saying that yes, this is what he wanted. An erection just wasn't enough, and by all that's holy, I needed his approval to do something more. An eye-fuck wasn't good enough, either, no matter how many other signals he was giving me. In this century and the ones preceding it, I learned the hard way to let the other man tell me he wanted to do something, to reassure me that he wouldn't take offense, or, worse yet, hurt me. Just because I couldn't stay dead doesn't mean things didn't _hurt, _and I'd been killed more often than I like to remember for coming on to a man in the wrong place or time.

Not that I thought Ianto would hurt me. No matter what else was going on, no matter what else he was hiding, Ianto Jones wasn't a violent man. A word, a kiss, a touch to my cheek or hip, anything would have worked for me… but he remained still, tasting my breath and pheromones but not doing anything to move things along. Damn it, what more did I need to do to get him to make the next move? (There are times, and this was one of them, when I wished I didn't give a damn about things like ethics. I also wished I was feeling more assertive, but I had a sense that too much assertiveness would have Ianto running away instead of towards me, no matter how attracted to me he was.)

I tilted up my chin in challenge, daring him to kiss me, while at the same time telling him that I would reciprocate if he offered. I could feel the tremor in his body. I could read the desire in his eyes and the hesitancy of kissing another man, a stranger, someone he'd been stalking for the last day. I licked my lips and parted them slightly in invitation.

The next thing I knew, he was kissing me, with lips and tongue and teeth, one hand in my hair, the other stroking my cheek. This was, by far, _the best first kiss I'd ever experienced_. He was eager and enthusiastic and he tasted oh, so _good_!

Before long the intensity jumped a notch and I found myself pulling off his tie and unbuttoning a few buttons of his shirt so I could kiss and nibble on his neck. I took advantage of his distraction and rolled us so that I was on top, his head falling back to the floor to give me greater access as I cushioned him with a hand on the back of his head. I sucked on his collarbone and he gasped. His hands pulled my shirts free of my trousers and he stroked up my chest, over my nipples, down my back as he squirmed against me. I chuckled and started in on his ear. By now his shirt was completely open and I could run my fingers through that wonderful chest hair I had but glimpsed that morning on the quay.

He flipped us again, straddling me, working my belt open and my fly down. I could feel the heat of his arousal against mine and thrust upwards, rubbing against him. Then his hands were down the front of my trousers as he captured my mouth again in a kiss that left us both breathless. He touched me with the usual hesitancy of someone with a new lover, and while that sort of thing might have bothered me in the past, with him it was exactly what I wanted. Mind you, _I_ had absolutely _no_ hesitation when I opened his trousers and took his erection in hand, cupping his balls and stroking along his length, running my thumb over the tip. He shuddered and I could see him fighting to keep from coming too soon. The look on his face was priceless, wanton, desperate for release and struggling against it, wanting the pleasure to last longer.

_If this is how he is now, just wait til I've had some time with him,_ I promised myself. _ I'll have him begging. I'll have him__ passing out from the pleasure and demanding more when he comes to. I'll send him to heights he's never dreamed of and take him even higher. _

We were quickly reaching the point of no return, and there was that one niggling question that had to be asked, loathe it as I do. But he didn't know I had no need to ask, and in this century it's polite to ask, so as he let go of my cock to sit up and shuck off his suit jacket and shirt, I smiled breathlessly and plunged in, hoping, as I always did, that I'd found a lover who didn't insist on latex. With his enthusiasm for the task, I thought he might be willing. (Though considering the OCD tendencies, I might be in for a rude awakening. Still, I was going to ask. He might surprise me yet. It wouldn't be the first time.)

"I'm clean," I gasped. "And I know you are, too, so we don't need to use condoms unless…" He tensed, and not in a good way. "…you'd…" His eyes widened in sudden realization of what we were about to do. "…prefer…" I trailed off, the light bulb going off in my head as I interpreted the look in his eyes.

"You've never been with a man before, have you?" I blurted inelegantly, _not_ the way I would have wanted to put such a delicate question. The hesitation when he touched me before? It wasn't about starting something with a new lover, it was about me being a man! Shit, I _really_ didn't want him to be a virgin to this. But, on second thought, even without experience, he kissed like a dream and didn't seem at all upset by finding a cock between my legs. Actually, he seemed to be enjoying it… Oh, the things I could _teach him…_

He shook his head, nervousness morphing into slight panic. "Am I doing it wrong?" he demanded anxiously. I could hear uncertainty in his voice, the desire to please, the fear that he'd messed up and ruined everything. The worry that I'd make us stop. He sat there on top of me, his shirt still hanging open, though he didn't make a move to take it off. _Or_ put it back on. I would accept indecision. That was good. That wasn't outright rejection.

"You're doing great!" I reassured him. "Really, really great. I didn't know until just now." I met his eyes straight on, trying to convey my sincerity and acceptance of the situation, that I was just as ready to continue as he was. I settled both my hands on his thighs. He remained straddling me, his erection softening slightly.

"Why are you stopping?" he asked, and there were tears of frustration in his lust-blown eyes. "I don't want you to stop!" He gripped my shirt tightly, shaking me a little. He wanted to continue! Good. Very good.

I shook my head and smiled up at him, running my hands up and down his thighs in what I hoped was a comforting gesture. "If this is going to be your first time with a man, we're doing it properly," I told him in no uncertain terms.

"Properly?" he repeated, not understanding what I implied.

"On a bed, naked, with more lube than I have with me," I clarified. "I don't want to hurt you and I don't have what we need to make it comfortable for a first time. Where's your flat?" (In the heat of the moment I forgot the answer I already knew, but he didn't need to know how much I already knew about him, how much I'd researched him.)

"London," he answered, a blush creeping up his neck and onto his cheeks. "I'm staying with my sister. I can't bring you back there… I'm not — um — She doesn't know — um — _I _didn't know —"

_How adorable,_ I thought. _He didn't know he was attracted to men before me… I hope you're as quick a study as you seem to be, Ianto Jones. _

Yes, my ego was quite alive in that moment. When I have the time and inclination for it, I _love_ introducing people to sex. (Sex between men, in this case.) I'm very good, and I have no problems saying it. I was good before I met the Doctor, but since I became immortal, I've had the time to perfect my skills. I like to think that I'm giving my partners a gift they can give to everyone else they're with after me. There's nothing like giving someone pleasure like they've never known before and _knowing_ they're so blissed out because of you and what you've been doing to and with them. Ianto was well on his way to the erotic education of his lifetime.

"Then we'll have to go to mine," I said, wishing for the first time in a long while that I had a nicer flat. I lived at the Hub, I'd reasoned when I chose it, and didn't need it for more than a place to have an occasional shag or time away from the 24-hour a day job that is Torchwood. But Ianto Jones wasn't going to be an occasional shag, if I had any say in the matter, so I'd need to do some looking around, find a better place. At least the cleaning service had been by that week!

"We'll have to take care of this before we can move, right?" I asked, squeezing his erection gently. He was fully hard again, and grinned as he nodded. I kissed him, sitting up while I did it until I could press him down on his back. He groaned loudly when I pulled his trousers down and began licking and sucking on his cock.

"Oh, God!" he moaned. "How do you do that? It feels so good!"

I laughed quietly and continued, not bothering to answer beyond a whispered, "Tastes even better." (Which he did.)

Ianto did not disappoint. His first orgasm of the night filled my mouth and had me swallowing twice over. Ah, youth! I have biology and evolution on my side in these kinds of situations, but Ianto was young and horny, two things that would give him the stamina to keep up with me. Fantastic, as the Doctor would say.

"Come on, let's get this pterodactyl of yours taken care of and we'll head over to mine," I said when he was relaxed and ready to move again, knowing I'd be able to last without relief to get the job done if I needed to. I didn't want to push him to reciprocate the blow job if he wasn't ready. (Though he kissed me quite thoroughly after I'd blown him, meaning he wasn't _adverse_ to the taste of cum. His own, anyway. Still, there was time tonight, so I wasn't too concerned I'd go without.)

The feeling of needing to do everything for him that I'd had the night before crept back into my head, making me slightly paranoid. Did he really want this? Would he be willing to go to my flat with me? Would he be willing to let me take care of him? I paused, trying to gauge his reaction to everything that had just happened. "If you still want to, that is," I added softly. I didn't want to sound hesitant, but I wanted to give him room to say no if he wanted. It was a tough balance, and even now I don't know how I sounded.

"Oh, I want to," he murmured, leaning over to lick my ear. "There's nothing I want more than to feel you inside me, Jack," he whispered, and the words combined with his hands on my cock and the throatiness of his voice as he said my name sent me over the edge.

_Damn it! Where did my control go?_ It was almost embarrassing how quickly he had me coming, but he didn't know how long I could usually last, so I ignored it for the moment. I panted for a few moments as he kissed down my neck and gave me a love-bite just under my collar. Then he surprised me by licking his hands clean. He didn't go near my cock, but that was fine. Again, there was time for that later, and that he was willing to taste my cum indicated that he'd probably be willing to do it again, if the expression on his face was any clue. He looked like he was enjoying the taste, and the expression in his eyes told me he was watching my reaction closely.

_Oh, Ianto Jones, you're going to be a delight to bed, aren't you? _I thought, a smirk on my lips as I enjoyed the little show. _And it seems like you're a bit of a tease. I can work with that. _

We put ourselves back together, gathered up the pterodactyl, and climbed into the SUV, images of what I would do to him dancing in both our heads.

_This one is special,_ I told myself, not quite knowing why, though I had an idea that I _didn't_ want to think about. _This one is for keeps. _


	6. Chapter 6

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 6**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: This was supposed to be a short little humorous chapter... It took on a life of its own. Enjoy!

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"Just so you know, I'm letting you into the base to help with this thing, but this _isn't_ a job offer," I told Ianto as we carried the unconscious pterodactyl to the invisible lift. He didn't reply immediately, his concentration on keeping his footing.

"We're still going to yours, though?" he asked, a hint of eagerness in his voice, coupled with nervousness, making me smile.

"Definitely," I replied, grinning. There was no way I'd let him go back to his sister's after what had happened in the warehouse. Especially after the teasing way in which he'd licked my cum off his fingers. You don't tease Jack Harkness like that and expect to get away from him without getting fucked… Back at my flat we'd see what Mr. Jones was capable of, of that I had no doubts. I had a feeling that he was a natural at _all_ of it.

We set down the dinosaur, tarp and all, on the slab and I straddled her. She was starting to wake up and move around a little, and I didn't want to take any chances of her flying away while on the lift. Ianto settled on top of her, mimicking my pose. "Do you trust me?" I asked.

"Yes," he answered immediately, and I could tell he was answering more than one question. Yes, he trusted me about the pterodactyl. Yes, he trusted me about the invisible lift. Yes, he trusted that I wouldn't retcon him for seeing the base if I said I wouldn't. Yes, he trusted me with his body for sex.

"Good." I pressed the button on my vortex manipulator to lower us, setting it to move slower than usual. I didn't want to startle either one of them. Our eyes met as the stone began to move. His eyes widened slightly in surprise, but then his gaze softened. He licked his lips, inviting me closer in the same way I'd done an hour ago. I scooted forward and kissed him. He gripped my arm and kissed me back. All the passion and desire we shared in the warehouse came flooding back into my system, and I marveled at the fact that I was sitting on a prehistoric beast kissing the most beautiful man I'd ever seen in my long life as we descended into my secret lair of a base, half an hour away from taking him to bed.

Goddess, I loved my life!

We broke away from each other when the stone settled to a stop on the floor. His cheeks were pink again, and we both needed a moment to catch our breath. I watched as he looked around, and I could see his archivist's mind cataloging the various alien artifacts littered about. I decided to test him.

"Stay here," I told him. "I'm going to get a few things. Make sure she doesn't move." He nodded, and I caught him watching my arse as I walked away. Fifteen minutes later, he hadn't moved from his place on top of the pterodactyl, though she was moving more and more. I injected another dose of the sedative.

"Is it safe to give her more of that?" Ianto asked, climbing off her after I gave permission. I'd watched him on the CCTV for a few minutes while I was away from him, and he hadn't moved from his perch, though he continued looking around. It was a good sign that he was able to follow orders.

"Safe enough. I need her out for this next part." I handed him a small piece of tech. "Seen one of these before?"

He examined it for a minute, turning it in his fingers before handing it back. "I haven't," he admitted. He paused and met my eyes. "Should I have?"

"No, since I made it myself."

"Well, it's a good thing I didn't try to fake it, then, isn't it?" he asked, his eyes twinkling. "I haven't seen much of the tech you have on display, if you're wondering, though I have some theories about a few of the more common-seeming pieces."

"You were in the Archives at the Tower. I'd expect you to be able to make some connections."

"I thought this wasn't a job offer," he murmured.

"It's not." _At least not for the job you're thinking of, _I thought. _You've already got a place in my bed. We decided that earlier. Now I just need to know how far I can trust you._ "I'm going to put this under her skin right here," I said, pointing. "It will help me toilet-train her."

"How does it work?"

"Sonic technology," I explained as I got to work. "This will act like one of those anti-barking dog collars that have become popular lately. Only it won't actually shock her. I'll program it to her brain patterns and set up a regimen to teach her where it's acceptable to leave her business. If I have time, I might even be able to train her to do other things. Once she's fully-trained, I can remove it."

"Sonic technology? The only sonic thing I've heard of is the Doctor's sonic screwdriver. It is like that?"

I blinked, letting my Captain mask fall into place. Working at the Tower I knew he'd be aware of the Doctor, but I didn't expect the topic to come up so quickly. I wondered if he'd know the rumors that I traveled with the Doctor. If he knew, I might have to retcon him, sex or no sex. I couldn't let someone who knows about my relationship with the Doctor loose on the world. He could hurt too many people with that knowledge, hurt _me_ with that knowledge. I've been tortured far too many times by people who knew about that.

He must have noticed the change in my manner, because he sat up stiffly, tugging on his cuffs to straighten them.

"Before we go any farther, Jack, I need to tell you that I don't hold with the usual Torchwood policy towards the Doctor. Few of us in the Archives did, for that matter. We know he's saved the planet on countless occasions, and if I ever have the honor to meet him, I'll thank him for doing it. I also know that you've traveled with him. The records about him are extensive, and I've seen pictures of the two of you in Cardiff together."

He took a deep breath and continued. "I want you to be able to trust me, Jack, whether it's as an employee or as something else. I will gladly keep whatever secret you see fit to tell me. And I'll keep the secrets you haven't told me that I already know about you."

"How many people know?" I choked out, sure he was talking about my immortality. So far, I'd been able to keep it from Tosh, Owen and Suzie, but Yvonne had known. Most of the higher-echelon Torchwood people had known. That he, a mere junior researcher, knew scared the piss out of me.

"Of the survivors, only me, I'd wager," he said softly. "Again, those of us in the Archives know more than one might think. I should probably tell you that I researched you before I came here."

I laughed, finally relaxing now that he was being completely honest. He smiled tentatively.

"And what did you find out, Ianto Jones?" I asked, batting my eyelashes at him flirtatiously, deliberately using his name to draw him out even farther.

"Honestly? Not much. The servers were down by the time I remembered about the Cardiff offices, but I found a few files in the rubble. They talked about your recruitment and some of your early cases as an uncontracted agent." He let his shoulders slump. "It sounds like a horrible time for you. It sounds like you carry a horrible burden, just by living." He reached over and touched my hand. "I'll do what I can to lighten it, if you want." I blinked back a sudden tear and pulled my hand away. I rebuilt my mask.

"We need to finish this," I said decisively. He nodded silently, not meeting my eyes. Without words, we moved the pterodactyl off the lift to a safer place for her.

He knew about the torture I'd survived at the hands of Alice and Emily. He knew I couldn't die. He knew, and he _wasn't running!_ He wasn't running, and he was _offering support!_ Shit, this was unheard of. No one had _ever_ expressed sympathy for my condition, for what I've been through. No one had ever implied that it was anything other than wonderful, when for me it was a whole other kind of torture.

Ianto Jones was special, of that I had no doubt. There was no way I could have him working for me, knowing what he knew. I needed him to be away from all this. I needed him for me, so I could have to comfort he offered. He'd be wasted at Torchwood, even at my Torchwood. I needed him to be safe, and Torchwood isn't safe. The average age of an active Torchwood field agent at the time of death is 27. That wouldn't give us much time together, since _all_ Torchwood agents would be field agents, now that Canary Wharf fell.

Ianto Jones, a twenty-three year old Welshman, could be the answer to my loneliness. He already understood me in ways no one else could. He already _wanted_ me…even though he knew any relationship we had would be doomed, that I would outlive him by decades, centuries. He knew he wouldn't be my last lover, and still he was offering himself to me!

I had to think. I had to decide how far to let him in. I had to see if it would be safe to love him… Not that I could have stopped loving him, even then, though I didn't know it yet…

"Tell me what you want me to do," he offered.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I let it out, opening my eyes to meet his. "Come home with me," I whispered.


	7. Chapter 7

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 7**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Here's a nice long chapter to make up for the delay in posting. Enjoy!

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Ianto and I rode in silence to my flat. I spent the time trying to get myself out of Captain-space and back into a mood for sex. Usually, I can jump from one to the other in a split second, but Ianto startled me by talking about the Doctor. And he startled me even more by knowing about my immortality and wanting to help me deal with the pain of it. I glanced over at him a few times, but he was staring out the window.

I parked the SUV and pulled the keys from the ignition, turning to him with a slightly crooked smile on my face. "I don't spend much time here," I warned him. "So don't get your hopes up about a luxurious flat."

He glanced over at me before shrugging. "As long as it has the bed you were promising," he answered, offering a small smile in return. I could see the lust simmering behind his eyes and it sparked my own, sending me back into that happy place I'd been looking for. We entered the building side-by-side.

As soon as the door to the flat closed behind us, I took him in my arms and kissed him, pressing his back against the wall. We stood there kissing in the dark and running our hands over each other's clothed bodies to ease the hunger for a few minutes before he asked for the tour. With a chuckle I flipped the light switch.

"You weren't kidding. I had better flats in Uni!" he exclaimed, amusement in his voice. "To think, this is where Jack Harkness lives," he murmured. I I hung up my coat and watched him take in the small kitchen, the dining table and pair of chairs, the large bed with matching nightstands. I felt a moment of insecurity. Maybe I should have a bigger couch? A bigger television? There was room, barely, unless I got a flatscreen, and somehow, if I was going to spend the money on that, I felt like I'd want to put it in a better looking place than this. His eyes scanned the bookshelves, and he took a step towards them before he remembered where he was. "Have a seat," he said, pointing at the table. "I'll make some coffee."

"Okaaaay… I doubt I have coffee in, though."

"That's OK. I brought my own," he said with a smirk. He removed his suit jacket and draped it over the chair opposite the one I chose. He hefted the small carryall I hadn't even noticed he'd been carrying and walked to the kitchen.

As I watched, Ianto rolled up his sleeves and got to work. He moved around the kitchen gracefully, opening cabinets and drawers, examining the contents of the refrigerator, and, finally pulling several items from his bag, including a small thermos and a air-tight jar of coffee grounds. He cleaned to coffee machine, tutting softly over its simplicity and the sort of filters I used. Without pausing, he started washing mugs and spoons and various other bits of mismatched crockery from my cabinets. I waited.

"I'm a bit nervous," he admitted as he set a mug of coffee in front of me and took the seat opposite me with his own. "Coffee calms me. I've never done this kind of thing before."

"What kind of thing are we talking about?" I asked, sipping my coffee. It was just what I needed, and somehow he knew I was in the mood for cream, which must have been in the thermos because I knew I didn't have any in the fridge.

"Having sex with a stranger."

"You're more nervous about that than having sex with a man?" I wondered aloud.

"I find myself thinking that the sex of one's partner isn't as important as the person him- or herself. You have a way of expanding the horizons of the other people about you. Besides, I trust you to know what you're doing with someone like me," he answered. Then he smiled brightly. "And if it's anything like what was going on at the warehouse, I'd be an idiot to stop now. That was fantastic!"

I grinned at him and reached for his hand. I stroked my thumb over the back of his hand, and he started relaxing immediately. "How do I become 'not a stranger,' Ianto?"

"I'm not sure. We'd have to spend time together, I guess."

"Before or after sex?"

He blinked a few times, processing my question. "Um, well, sex is a way to get to know each other, isn't it?"

"Of course."

"So, by having sex with you, that makes you not a stranger anymore."

"I can live with that logic." I tugged on his hand gently and maneuvered us to the bed. We sat down, our hands still clasped. I traced his cheekbone with the fingers of my other hand, and he closed his eyes as I caressed him. I pulled him forward into a brief but passionate kiss. His hands settled on my thighs and he shifted closer. We kissed more deeply. He slid my braces down.

"Can we talk about the condom thing again?" he asked a few minutes later when he realized he'd been rubbing my erection through my trousers. I'd kept up the small, intimate touches to his face and head, enjoying the opportunity to have time to be like that with a lover after several years of relatively meaningless and most certainly emotionless sex. Not to mention the sex I'd paid for, but that was a whole other can of worms I wasn't going to be thinking about that night. If Ianto wanted me, really wanted me, I had the feeling I wouldn't need to seek release anywhere else for as long as we were together.

"Sure." I pulled back so we could see each other's expressions during the talk.

"You said you were clean, and it seems you prefer not to use them…" He paused. "Is it your condition that keeps you safe?"

"A combination of that, evolution and inoculation. I had a job once that made sure I wouldn't be able to catch most of the illnesses humans can catch throughout the universe. The ones I _can_ catch haven't been developed yet."

He nodded thoughtfully. "You're from the 51st Century," he stated. We both knew the answer, so I didn't respond. "It's been a while since I've had sex without condoms. Except for the girlfriend before Lisa, who was on the pill, I always used them. Lisa really didn't want to get pregnant, so we used them and she took birth control pills."

"Reasonable. Unwanted and unexpected pregnancies can cause all kinds of emotional and relational upheavals between people."

"A girlfriend I was seeing in Uni tried to claim that a condom broke when she got pregnant. It turns out she was cheating on me and thought I had better prospects for a job than the real father of the child."

"You figured it out?"

"He confronted me for trying to steal away his woman and child. I got the picture, dumped her, and moved on. Brigitte and I were exclusive for the short time we dated, then I met Lisa. Lisa and I were exclusive, though we talked about the possibility of other people, just in case one of us was attracted to someone else, because I didn't want a repeat of the thing with Veronica. I wanted us to be able to talk about it in the open rather than go behind each other's backs."

He was talking a lot about past lovers and their relationships. Was this a good sign? What did it mean for what we were going to do? Was he going to ask me to only be with him? I had no idea what I'd say if he did. Part of me wanted to agree, but that was ridiculous, since we hadn't even slept together yet! Were we getting into a relationship? Were we dating? Shit, it's been too long since I've actually dated someone. I'm not sure I know the rules!

He sighed. "I'm a one lover at a time person, Jack. That's what I like and prefer. That way my partner gets all my attention, romantically, anyway. You should know that about me."

"I'm not," I said cautiously.

"I know, and I wouldn't expect you to be," he said seriously. "I mean, even if _half_ of what was said about you around the water cooler was true, it would be ridiculous to think you'd be monogamous. I don't think it would bother me as long as we talk about it."

"That's very modern thinking of you." We stared into each other's eyes for a moment. "I don't always have more than one lover," I explained, part of me wanting — _needing_ — him to accept me. "In fact, I usually prefer to only have one, but I need the option to be available. I need to be able to flirt and take it as far as it goes. It's about me needing the freedom to be me. I've tried being monogamous and it doesn't work well for either of us. I get resentful, angry. I withdraw, and it sours everything."

"So, what if we decided that I'd be faithful to you and you had the option for being with other people, though there's not an expectation that you'd definitely do it or not do it? If you're sure you can't catch or carry anything, I think I'd be willing to forgo condoms for the time being."

"That sounds better than I expected would come of this conversation," I said, kissing him again. He melted into the kiss, pulling me down on top of him as he laid back. I crawled over him, positioning him as I went so that he was sprawled out in the center of the bed. I started undoing his shirt buttons for the second time that night. He pulled his lips away from mine for a moment.

"Jack? One more thing."

"Yeah?"

"I really hope you're as good as your reputation says," he growled as he pulled me into another kiss and started in on taking off our clothes. I just laughed and prepared to show him a night of pleasure he'd never forget.

Ianto's second orgasm of the night impressed me even more than the first had, accompanied as it was by a hoarse cry of my name and an almost impossible to bear tightening around my cock. I let go, spilling into him as he shot across my sheets. We collapsed into a tangled heap of arms and legs and torsos, each of us delirious with pleasure and short of breath. We'd taken a lot of time getting to this point, and the anticipation I drew out was well worth the effort. I rolled him to his back so I could kiss his lips again after the enforced distance while I fucked him from behind. (Not the position I would have chosen for a first time, but he wanted "the classic experience," so I went along with it. The way I saw it, we'd have much more time for other things both later that night and in the future.)

We lay there for half an hour, just kissing and cuddling, nuzzling necks and trailing fingers along overheated skin. He dozed while I watched him, enjoying the unguarded expression on his face. He woke up to find me still looking at him and the first thing he did was whisper my name through a sleepy smile as he touched my face gently. The look in his eyes was remarkably similar to love, though I didn't want to get ahead of things and convinced myself that it was just the wonder of a new relationship and a _very thorough fuck_. I returned the smile and kissed him.

And, no, I didn't take the time to consider the look in _my_ eyes and how close it was to what I was seeing in his. I hadn't admitted I loved him yet, that night, though looking back, I did.

We showered together, mostly because I'd "forgotten" to clean us up, and enjoyed the hot water and soapy skin as I showed him the glory of a good scalp massage. (He'd never had one before, and certainly never had one while naked, and even more certainly never had one that turned into another round of sex.) He appreciated my thoroughness.

As we lay in bed after the shower, he started asking questions about sex between men, and what else we might do. We even touched on some of the kinkier kinds of sex we might try, and he enthusiastically chose a safeword in preparation. Everything felt so good and natural, he told me, despite us both being men, and I answered that that's how sex _should_ feel, no matter the gender of one's partner. We talked for several hours, about that and other things, before a third round, and he enjoyed it just as much as all the others, if not more, since this time I managed to keep him on his back so I could see the expression on his face when he came. I think I convinced him it was worth repeating.

Depending on how long this thing lasted, I might even consider letting him top me, not something I feel comfortable allowing all that often. But if he's going to be more than just a shag, I reasoned, there's no logical purpose to keeping the sex "one-way." It would feel good to trust someone enough to let them top me. It's been far too long.

And if Ianto were that person… I'd be a happy man.


	8. Chapter 8

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 8**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: I just spent the last three days at an anime convention, letting some of my other geekiness out. It was a blast! Anyway, here's the latest chapter where I expand upon something Ianto mentioned in his diary in Ianto Wakes, only from Jack's perspective. Enjoy!

.

I must have dozed off at some point during the night, because the next thing I knew, my mobile was ringing. Ianto shifted with me as I snagged it from the nightstand. I checked caller ID and frowned.

"Owen," I said curtly, hoping to discourage him from a long conversation. Unfortunately a yawn interrupted me, and my jaw cracked loudly enough that I'm sure he heard it.

"Where the fuck are you and why is there a bleeding _dinosaur_ in the Hub?" he demanded angrily. "And do you have any idea that it's past ten in the morning?"

"Looks like someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed," I teased, my free hand running along Ianto's arm. His skin puckered with gooseflesh. "I left a note explaining."

"Yeah, Tosh showed me. '_She likes cod and I'll potty-train her soon.'_ Isn't. Enough. Information! She shat on my head!" I couldn't help the laughter that bubbled up, and I let Owen curse himself out. It gave me the opportunity to kiss Ianto a few times. I don't think Owen noticed.

I sat up and tried to straighten my sleep- and sex-mussed hair. Ianto grumbled quietly about the cold. He pulled the duvet closer around himself and thus off me, so I lay back down and wrapped myself around him. He started kissing my neck until I sighed in pleasure.

"Wait, are you with someone?" Owen growled, having finally wound down enough to pay attention. "Did you drop this thing off and go out on the pull? That's — that's just irresponsible! What if it had ruined Tosh's station? What if it had shat all over Suzie's research?"

Before I could respond, Ianto grabbed my phone. "He'll be back with you in an hour," he told Owen. He closed the phone and tossed it to the nightstand. It started ringing. "Ignore it," he said, kissing me hard. "Take me one more time before we have to leave."

After a quick tumble in the sheets and an even quicker shower, I got dressed. Ianto, propped up in bed with all the pillows holding him up comfortably, watched with dazed eyes. Clearly, he was still recovering from the sex. Good. I walked over, sat on the edge of the bed, and leaned in to kiss him.

"Will you stay until later?" I asked softly. I traced his cheekbone with my fingers, like I'd done the night before, and he leaned into the caress again. _It seems that he likes the small, affectionate touches. I'll have to remember that,_ I promised myself.

"You want me to stay?" he responded, clearly both surprised and touched. "I didn't expect —"

I graced him with the tender smile I rarely let out. "We talked about it yesterday, Ianto. I can tell that you don't want a one-night stand and I'm willing to offer you more than that. Stay, please. I'd like to know you'll be here when I get off work tonight."

His lips twitched upwards and I could see a shy, yet brilliant smile forming. "I'll make supper," he offered. "Are you allergic to anything? Is there anything you wouldn't want to eat?"

It took me a moment to understand what he was asking. In my time, allergies to food have been eliminated, so it's not something I think of naturally. And I'd spent far too many years in the army, jail, or being tortured to have any qualms about what I ate. I ate when I needed to, and that was that. I didn't think about food often, except when I could apply it to sex, or when it was particularly good. And lately, I'd just been eating whatever the others wanted in terms of takeaway at work. Tosh would bring me coffee and a muffin or something when she came in, and we'd always order lunch and supper from one of the various takeaway places we liked. They all knew our order, so we just had to tell them our name.

I tilted my head to the side as I regarded him. He was a curious man, and I still hadn't figured him out yet. He was very open about talking about sex and relationship histories, but I knew nothing of his life in London, apart from what I got in that report. He hadn't told me anything about his family, either, though he'd mentioned his sister. He had secrets, just as I did. I didn't want to dig for them too hard, for that would encourage me to look at my own.

I trusted him, to a certain extent. I had a feeling that he wouldn't betray me. That when he made love, when he bonded with someone in that fashion, he was loyal and devoted and anything one could want in a partner. Did I need to know his secrets? Did I want to risk this tentative thing we were building to find them out? The immediate answer was a very forceful 'No!'

Looking back, with the lies and betrayals and hurt behind me, I realize how _naive_ I was. Me, naive? The intergalactic conman who could charm his way into and out of the Palace of Mironkili with the famed Rainbow Diamond in my hand, as well as the virtue of _two_ of the princesses? Yes, I was naive. I trusted him far too quickly, and far too much. And more than that, I didn't question that forceful 'no' that came into my head as soon as I thought about digging for his secrets. I didn't make the connection with the note in his Torchwood file about his latent empathic ability, nor did I consider that he'd try to manipulate me using it.

But that morning, all I knew was that I was excited at the prospect of seeing him later, of eating a meal he prepared for me, of taking him to bed again. I imagined a future where I'd take him out to posh dinners and the theater and anywhere he wanted to go. I imagined waking up next to him every morning. I imagined a life with him that didn't include Torchwood, that didn't include aliens and death and time travel and, dare I say it, didn't include the Doctor. It was absolutely terrifying to have these thoughts after knowing him for only a day and a half.

I quickly put all those fantasies away and handed him a spare key to the flat and all the cash in my wallet. "No allergies and I'll eat anything. I'll see you tonight, around eight. If it's any later I'll call."

I pecked him on the lips, intending to stand up and get to work, but he sighed appreciatively at the slight touch of our lips, so I had to kiss him deeper. We both got so lost in the kisses that my mobile ringing startled us. I pulled it out.

"Owen?"

"Lover Boy said you'd be here in an hour. That only gives you ten minutes. I know you, and I know what you've been doing, so stop it and get your arse out of bed and over here!"

"I'll have you know that I'm dressed and just walking out now," I told him, giving Ianto one last kiss. "I'll be there. Don't worry."

I flipped the phone closed. Ianto's fingers lingered in my hand as I stood, and I squeezed them before releasing his hand. "Do you have my number? Just in case?" he asked.

"I'm Torchwood. Of course I know it," I answered.

"Ah. Well, have a good day at the office, dear," he said in a playful falsetto. I grinned in return, gave him yet another last kiss and left the flat, swishing my hips enticingly so that my coat swirled in the most provocative way.

I spent the whole ride to the Hub thinking about Ianto and our eventful first night together. It occurred to me that he might not be a bad fit with my particular brand of Torchwood, though I was still on the fence about putting him in danger. And, I reminded myself, I still didn't have the psychiatric records I wanted. And, before you ask, I've gotten psych records on potential lovers both before and since him, so it's not strange for me. I have to be careful about who I let stay in my bed longer than a night because they could be a danger, to either me or themselves. (I didn't care about the flat or what was in it. Things can be replaced, people can't. That's what my father used to tell me before he died and my brother went missing, and he was _right!_) All my instincts were telling me to trust Ianto, so, at the time, that's what I did.

I walked into the main area, still lost in thought. I must have had a just-got-shagged expression on my face because Tosh immediately blushed, Suzie snorted, and Owen grumbled. It sounded something suspiciously like 'why does he get to come in late after a shag when I don't?'

The pterodactyl swooped down towards us and everyone scattered. I opened my Vortex Manipulator and pressed a button. She stopped mid-dive and went back up to her perch on the upper gantries. I programed in a few simple commands and settled in for a day of training her.

"It's safe to come out now," I called to my team. They re-formed a semi circle around me. "So, what do you think of our new pet? I'll train her to recognize our scents so she doesn't attack us, and I'll get her toilet-trained."

"While you're at it, can you make sure she doesn't eat our food?" Tosh asked. "She charged me for my chocolate muffin this morning."

"Apparently she's fond of chocolate," I reported with a small smile for Ianto who figured that out somehow. "I don't know how to train her about what's OK to eat and what's not."

"I can do it," Suzie offered. "If we make a kind of sauce, like a barbecue sauce, and put it on everything we feed it, it'll learn only to eat what had the sauce on it."

"Excellent, that's your next project," I told her. "It has top priority. And remember, she's a girl, not an it!" Suzie groaned, but went to her station to begin her research. "Owen, I'll get her down here so you can check her medically. She's very far out of her time, and I'll need to know if there are certain minerals she needs or can't have, how our air quality will effect her, that sort of thing."

"I've already showered once since I've been here. I won't go near her unless you promise she won't do anything again."

"I'll do what I can. We can always sedate her, though I had to give her two doses last night and don't want to have to do it again if we can avoid it." He nodded and went to his area to get ready.

"Anything you want me to do, Jack?" Tosh asked. She followed me to my office and settled in the visitor's chair. I took my own seat. "Jack?"

"I took him home with me," I blurted, needing to confide in someone who might understand. I knew the other two wouldn't.

"Who?"

"Ianto Jones."

She sighed. "So the way to your heart is persistence?" she asked. "Really, Jack, are you sure this is a good idea? We still don't have enough information on him. And he's Torchwood London!"

"He doesn't think the Doctor's evil."

"You mean, he did his research and knew to tell you that," she pointed out.

It was my turn to sigh. "Yeah, I suppose you're right. One of my contacts got me his school records. They've been altered."

"Whoever did it is very good. I could only see traces, by looking for holes where things should've been changed but weren't."

"Well, as they say, 'keep your friends close and your enemies closer.'"

"I don't think they meant to take the enemies to bed," she said drolly.

"How much closer can you get? He was fantastic!"

"I don't need to hear it."

"Tosh, you wound me."

"I'm getting back to work. I'll let you know if I find anything else." She stood and turned to the door. Then she paused and turned back. "Let me know if you want to bug your place or monitor his computer."

"Monitor the computer. I don't want to bug the place yet." I leaned back in my chair. "You wouldn't want to have to listen to it, if you don't even want to hear me give you the edited version." I winked. She rolled her eyes and walked away.

By the time I left at quarter of eight that evening, the pterodactyl was mostly able to recognize our scents and Owen had designed a diet plan for her. We still had to toilet train her, but she was doing better and figured that might take a little longer. Tosh gave me a report on Ianto's computer usage, which included looking up recipes, emailing his sister to tell her that he'd be over later, and ordering a fancy coffee maker online. Nothing dangerous or suspicious. I couldn't tell what dinner would be from his browsing history, but they all looked reasonably good.

With a smile on my face I sent my team home and went to get changed for my date.


	9. Chapter 9

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 9**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Warnings for sex and mild BDSM in this chapter. Enjoy!

.

My flat smelled like cleanser and furniture polish, roasting chicken and rosemary. I felt a relaxed smile bloom on my face at the scent of the herb. Ianto had stayed! And he'd cooked for me, like he's said he would. It's hard to describe how touched I was in that moment, and not just because no one had cooked for me in years. I felt warmth building in my chest when I thought of the effort he'd gone through for me. He'd cleaned the flat, too, which I hadn't expected. (Knowing him as I do now, I would have.)

Ianto greeted me from the kitchen, calling a cheery hello. I joined him there and kissed him, slipping my arms around his waist while his settled around my neck very naturally and with absolutely no hesitation. Dressed in jeans and a red t-shirt and barefoot, he smelled like he'd just gotten out of the shower. I kissed him harder, thrusting my tongue into his mouth, seeking a taste of him. He groaned when our lips parted.

"There's twenty minutes until dinner's ready," he said breathlessly. Before I could make a lewd comment or suggest an activity, he'd pressed himself up against me so I could feel his swelling cock. "That's enough time for a quick shag, yeah?" he whispered, his breath hot on my ear, sending blood to my groin instantly. I had him on his back on the sofa, both of us naked, and me thrusting into him within minutes. He moaned and panted and demanded more. He was turning into a very vocal lover, and I _adored_ it!

"My mother used to grow rosemary in our kitchen when I was a child," I told him over dinner. "When the sun hit the window in the afternoon, it would brighten the leaves and make the whole house smell of it."

"My mum wasn't much of a cook," he replied. "Did yours use rosemary a lot in her dishes?"

"Yeah. It reminds me of home."

"You miss her," he commented.

"It's been a long time since I've seen my family," I muttered, closing off that line of thought. "Where did you learn to cook? This is delicious, by the way."

"I worked in a restaurant for a while," he answered, looking down at his food.

"As a busboy." His head shot up, his eyes wide with surprise. "I read your file, remember?" We ate in awkward silence for a moment. "So? Where did you learn to cook this well?"

"Lisa and I cooked together," he whispered, staring at his food again. His hands started shaking. I reached over and covered them with mine. He took a deep shuddering breath and let it out quickly. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be this upset… I shouldn't even be here… I shouldn't be doing what we've been doing…"

"Nothing to be sorry about," I said softly. "I know what it's like to lose a lover. People mourn in different ways, and yours is no less valid than anyone else's."

He looked up at me again, pulling one of his hands free to wipe at his tears. "I think you mean it," he murmured.

"Where I come from, having sex with someone new soon after a loved one has died isn't stigmatized. It can be a way of letting go. A way of celebrating that you're still alive. By being with a man, for you, it could be about mourning."

"I lost her, but since I'm shagging a guy it's OK?" he asked, snorting derisively.

"I'm not saying that's all of it. But it could be part. I've been on both sides of this particular situation before. You won't hear me say anything against you for it."

"Maybe not, but I still can't tell my sister."

"She's a product of this time, as are you," I said philosophically. "I won't be offended if you want to end it because you're not over her yet," I added, while internally I cursed myself for giving him the opportunity to beg off. I really didn't want him to, and I knew it even before I gave him the option. Still, I wasn't one for coercion, and I wanted him to be with me because he wanted to be with me.

We finished our dinner in silence after that, both of us lost in thought. I cleared the table and did dishes while he made coffee, the atmosphere between us still warm despite the dangling offer I'd made. We settled onto the sofa with our mugs and he curled against my side, cuddling, almost, his head resting on my shoulder and my arm around him.

"I don't want to stop being with you like this," he said into the silence. "But I want to talk about something."

"All right. What's on your mind?"

"I still want to work for you," he stated.

I paused for a minute to finish my coffee before answering. "I don't sleep with people who work for me," I told him simply. I set down my mug next to me.

"So it's either work for you and give up having sex with you, or have sex, but give up on getting the job?" he clarified. "May I ask why?"

"If my loyalty is to you as a lover, I can't be objective as your boss," I explained, thinking that this was obvious. And at a place like Torchwood, me losing my objectivity could get people hurt or killed. Better be very clear. "And I don't want to be accused of harassment." Then, because I can't stop flirting or creating innuendo, I added, "Unless we're doing a kinky scene of some kind. I bet you could get me hard just calling me 'sir' with that sexy accent of yours." We _had_ talked about that kind of thing the night before, after all, and I thought it would be interesting to try. Maybe now was the time?

"What about hiring a former lover?" he persisted, and now I was starting to get annoyed. Why was it so important to him that he work for me? Was this part of whatever secret he was hiding? Was it some way of staying close to his dead girlfriend, by continuing to work for the organization where they met, the organization that got her killed? Was it because Torchwood was all he knew now? I would teach him of other things. I would give him a different life, I promised myself.

"Never hired one before," I barked, more rudely than I expected to sound. Still, I didn't need this. I didn't want to lose him as a lover, not now that we'd been together a few times. He was just as quick to take to it as I'd thought he'd be, and from the few actual conversations we'd had, it seemed like he'd be able to give me some of the emotional support I was craving. I knew I'd be able to give him just as much.

"Maybe now's the time to try it," he suggested.

"You'd give up sex with me for a _job_?" I demanded, my temper flaring out of control. I slammed a hand down on the end table, rocking the coffee mug. I shoved him away from me. How could he insult me like this? _Me? _I'd never had a lover want to leave me before I was ready to let them go, and _I didn't like it_. There was more to this Ianto Jones than I knew, and even as he made me angry, I wanted to know more. I wanted to know everything about him. Every fear, every joy, every turn-on, every little bit of history in his little short life.

"I need the job. I need health benefits," he said.

"We have a national health care system!" I shouted, standing.

"I still need the job."

"You're on thin ice tonight, Jones," I growled, letting him know just how angry I was. Suddenly, I could smell his desire in the air and knew I'd have a way to distract him. I touched my lips with a finger, adopting a contemplative stance. "You want a job?" I asked. "Let's see how you take orders in a little _scene_ first, shall we? On your knees!"

He blinked in surprise for a moment before he slipped off the couch and knelt before me. I kicked the coffee table out of the way. He raised his eyebrow in question, waiting for the next order.

"Suck it," I told him.

"You'll give me a job if I do this?" he asked as he undid my belt and fly.

"No, we're doing a scene," I reminded him. "I'll be your boss, and you'll be the innocent intern I corrupt with my inappropriate sexual demands." His hands faltered pulling out my cock. "No?" I asked kindly, running my fingers through his hair. "Not ready for a scene just yet?"

"It's — It's not that, s- sir," he whispered, his voice higher than usual, nervous and stuttering. I could almost see him falling into character. "I've just never —" He broke off and looked down and away from me, a picture of embarrassed innocence. "I've just never done anything like that before." He looked at me through his eyelashes, and I was amazed at the transformation of his features. He looked half his actual age and about ready to pass out. "I've never seen such a large cock before," he added, stroking it fully-hard. "It scares me."

"It also excites you, though," I commented, tapping his obvious erection with the toe of my stocking-clad foot. As I pressed against him, I felt his cock moving against my foot, testing the confinement of the jeans. "You're drooling."

"What are you going to do with me, sir?" he asked, wiping at the drool. (He wasn't actually drooling, but he played along, which whetted my appetite for him even more.)

I grabbed his collar and dragged him to his feet. "I'm going to fuck you harder than you've ever been fucked in your entire life, boy," I growled low in my throat, a threat in my voice. His scent spiked higher in the air. Oh, he was _liking this_! I let go and watched him stumble back to his knees. "Now start sucking, or I'm going to strip you naked and spank you for every second you're making me wait."

He swallowed audibly and got to work. Little did he know I was going to spank him anyway.


	10. Chapter 10

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 10**

**By Gracefultree**

A/N: Picking up a few hours after we left off in the last chapter...

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Ianto was seconds away from his second orgasm when my mobile rang. I'd had two already, the first thanks to his sinfully skillful mouth and the second to how wonderfully tight his arse felt around me. Technically, though, we'd shagged before dinner, so it would be third and fourth of the evening, but who's counting? And how did he get so good at giving blow jobs when he'd only ever done it twice before? And both of those times with me? I must have been thinking about those wonderful Welsh vowels of his as he did it…

"Come for me, baby," I whispered, and he did. I pulled out, leaving him panting for breath, collapsed on his stomach in the small puddle. A few quick tugs and I was adding to the mess, spurting over the gorgeous expanse of his back. He groaned softly but didn't say anything or move as I reached over him for the phone.

"Tosh? What's up?"

"_I just finished translating that piece of script from a few days ago. It's a ransom note for the planet," _she said, sounding surprisingly calm. "_It says they'll destroy the planet tomorrow if we don't give them sovereignty over it, and they described their weapons. Looks real to me." _

"What do they call themselves?" I asked, heading for the bathroom. "And do I have time for a shower?"

"_A shower? What were you doing that you — Oh. Never mind. Is it still Ianto, or have you moved on?" _

I grinned to myself as I turned on the water. "It's still him."

"_Make it a quick one, then. They call themselves 'The Maninites." _

I sighed, stepping under the water and soaping up, having put the phone on speaker. "They're known for having a certain amount of firepower, but I'll need to see the exact wording of the document. There might be a way to talk our way out of it. You haven't told anyone else yet, I assume?" I let the water wash away the soap.

"_Really, Jack. Who do you think I am?" _

I laughed along with her and shut off the water. "I'll be there in ten. Alert the others, will you?"

"_Done." _

I hung up and returned to the bedroom to dress. Ianto had rolled to his back and was wiping ineffectively at the stickiness on his abdomen. He grimaced at me. "Didn't think about the cleanup required for two men together," he muttered. "Guess I better take care of this." He moved to get out of bed, but I put a hand on his shoulder and held him down.

"We're not done yet," I told him. "I expect you here when I get back, understand?" I dropped a kiss on his mouth and strode from the flat, my mind already on the Maninites and the possibilities for world destruction should they be from a powerful caste.

Halfway down the hall to the lift I realized my mistake in ordering Ianto to stay at my flat. That wasn't the way I wanted things to go. I swung around. He was in the shower when I got back, and I decided I didn't want to disturb him and risk getting into a long conversation when I had a potential alien invasion on my hands, so I pulled a postcard from one of the pockets of my coat and scrawled a quick note to him. I propped it against the coffee maker, where I knew he'd see it and left again.

I let myself into the flat twenty-seven hours later, having faced down the Maninites, captured three weevils, and helped Owen stitch up a wounded Hoix before handing it over to UNIT. Ianto called me around eleven, but I hadn't been able to answer, and he hadn't left a message, so I wasn't sure whether or not he'd be home when I got there. I hoped he'd be there, though. I slipped out of my boots in the front hall and hung my coat on the usual hook. Neither his coat nor his shoes were there. I felt a sourness in the pit of my stomach. He hadn't stayed. Well, it was my own fault, wasn't it?

In the kitchen I found a covered dish and a note. "_Thought you might like some supper. If you've eaten, just put it away and have it for lunch tomorrow. —I" _

I lifted the lid and saw that he'd turned the leftovers from the night before into a stew of some kind. I let myself fall into the chair and picked up a spoon. Even cold, it was delicious. I suddenly regretted the Chinese I'd scarfed down two hours before. With a sigh I covered the dish and took it to the fridge. Better save it for tomorrow when I could appreciate it, even if the man who made it was gone.

In my mind I saw the report Tosh handed me on my way out of the Hub, of Ianto's computer usage for the day. More recipes, emails to friends, confirmation of having lunch with his sister and her children, and a lot of searching of newspapers for information about Canary Wharf. Of course he'd be looking at that. I wondered if it would be right to ask him to help prepare the memorial service for the victims, then immediately dismissed the thought. It wasn't his responsibility.

The last paragraph of the report was typical Tosh. "_He also looked at health websites, focusing on gay sex and 'standard practices.' He must be into you, too. Go easy on him. He was researching the complications of too much anal sex." _

_My poor Ianto,_ I thought to myself. _Eager and willing and too nervous to ask me about it. I hope he's ok. Maybe I'll give him a break and let him top me next time. If there is a next time. _

I'm not sure where that seed of doubt came from, but it shocked me none the same. That I wanted him so much that I worried that I wouldn't see him again? Unheard of for me! I hurried to the bedroom to see if he was there, wondering if the food was more of a sign than the absent shoes.

Sure enough, he lay curled on his side facing away from the door. He shifted restlessly, whimpering softly, and I realized that he must be having a nightmare. I quickly undressed and climbed into bed next to him, holding him tightly and kissing his shoulder, the closest part of his body I could reach comfortably. He seemed to calm down then, relaxing against me.

I let my mind wander as I held him while he slept. I dozed off for the second time in two days. There was something about being with Ianto that relaxed me, that made me feel comfortable enough to sleep. It seemed I provided the same comfort for him because he slept through the rest of the night without a nightmare.


	11. Chapter 11

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 11**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: As this is Jack's story, we see into his head more and more as the chapters get written. This particular Jack, as some of you have commented, is very loving, and, I think, sort of willing to discuss them with Ianto. I can only imagine his heartbreak when he finds out Ianto's real agenda. Oh, wait, I _did_ imagine it! Keep up the comments and I'll be able to write faster... knowing people are reading inspires the mind. Enjoy!

.

It was almost two o'clock in the afternoon, and Ianto wasn't in my flat. Normally, if a lover wasn't where I expected them to be, I didn't tend to care overly much. In my life, lovers came and went with some regularity and I let them. It was safer for me that way. But this was Ianto we're talking about.

Ianto Jones, a man who'd already changed me more than I knew. A man who intrigued me from the start. A man who's simple question changed everything.

_So you're not going to help me catch this pterodactyl, then? _

A man who's simple acceptance of 51st century pheromones blew me away. Who's kiss on the floor of a warehouse opened up a world of possibilities I'd never considered for the way I lived my life. A man who's very presence calmed me and allowed me to sleep more restfully and dreamlessly than I could ever remember in my adult life. A man who made love to me unashamedly and with all the passion in his heart and body and soul.

Or so I thought at the time.

I'd sent my team home early so we could all have a break. We'd had middle of the night call outs four days in a row, and I was annoyed at how much it was cutting into my sex life. So I sent them all home and went to mine, intending to spend most of the next sixteen hours in bed with Ianto. But he wasn't there and I was starting to panic. Where was he? Was he ok?

_Take a deep breath, Jack,_ I told myself. _He's probably just out shopping. He cooks fresh meals every night, so he's just getting spinach, or whatever vegetable he's going to feed me._ That settled, I relaxed a little. I stripped off my coat and boots. I padded into the bedroom, intending to lie down to wait for him.

By four, with no sign of him, the panic started to resurface. I swallowed it down and dialed his number on my mobile.

"Good afternoon, Jack," he said, a smile in his voice. "I'm a little busy right this minute, but is there something you need?"

"Oh, I gave everyone the afternoon and evening off and was hoping to catch you before you started cooking so I could take you out," I answered calmly, hoping to entice him with promises for something other than our usual pattern.

"You want to take me out?" He asked, sounding surprised. "To dinner?"

"Yeah. Is that so strange?"

"No! No, not strange at all."

"Where are you?"

"London," he answered, rather reluctantly.

"Are you leaving me?" The words left my mouth and hung in the air between us before I was aware I'd spoken, let alone how needy I'd sounded. The silence as I waited for his answer nearly deafened me.

Then Ianto chuffed softly into the phone. "Of course not!" he exclaimed. "I'm just getting some things from my flat. I'll be back in Cardiff at 8:04, if the train's on time."

"Oh. Oh, good. Um, yeah. Sorry," I babbled. "Don't know what came over me. You want me to pick you up at the station and take you out?"

"I'd like that," Ianto said gently.

"I'll get us a reservation," I told him.

"Thanks." He paused, and I could almost hear him thinking. "Jack? I'm sorry I didn't tell you I was coming to London today. I didn't mean to worry you. I just thought I needed some other clothes, and why buy more when I have then here?"

"I wasn't worried," I blustered, and I could practically see him raising a skeptical eyebrow at me. He was so good at doing that. Not to mention that it was totally hot! "OK, I was worried. But you shouldn't have to tell me where you're going. I just got, I don't know, worried that you weren't here."

"It's OK, Jack. I'll be home soon, and then I'll make it up to you, yeah?"

"Yeah," I answered. "I'll see you at the station."

"Bye."

.  
.

I stood by the SUV feigning nonchalance when Ianto arrived. Dressed in a dark suit and purple shirt, with a striking red tie, he looked good enough to eat. I watched him looking for me, then was rewarded with a huge smile when he spotted me. He picked up his pace and strode over to me, an air of confidence about him. Without bothering to look around at who was nearby, he grabbed the back of my head and dragged me a step forward into a kiss considerably more intimate than the public were used to seeing, no matter the gender of the people doing the kissing. I kissed him back, of course.

We disentangled ourselves after the third wolf whistle and he threw his carryall and garment bag on the back seat before climbing into the passenger seat next to me. We kissed again, and his hand slid up my thigh. I broke away reluctantly, knowing he could read the hunger in my eyes. He gave me another kiss and removed his hand.

"Miss me?" he asked, still smiling, rather smugly, I might add.

"Nah, not a bit," I replied trying to joke away my earlier anxiety. I pulled into traffic.

"You don't like to be vulnerable, do you?" he asked suddenly.

"Does anyone?" I shot back quickly.

"You're evading the question."

"I plead the fifth."

"What?"

"The fifth amendment to the US constitution. It says –"

"That you don't have to say anything if you're just going to incriminate yourself, I know," Ianto finished for me. "But being vulnerable isn't anything to be ashamed of. Not with me. You've seen my nightmares, haven't you? You've woken me up a few times. I'm not going to judge you." I nodded and concentrated on my driving. "Seems to me like you had a bit of a panic attack when you couldn't find me," he commented, the smile still on his face. "Is the famous Captain Harkness really that insecure?" he joked. "Did you really think I was leaving you because you couldn't find me for an hour?" He laughed. I wasn't amused, not by a long shot.

"People can die," I muttered.

"Of course they can, but I wasn't dead. I was just a few hours away. I didn't even think you'd notice I was gone, since you've had so many late nights in a row this week."

"You don't understand," I replied, making a hard turn that had him clutching at the bar above the door to keep from rolling into me. He yelled out it protest. "No one understands."

"So explain it," he suggested, still holding tightly to the bar.

I made another hairpin turn and shot through a red light, barely aware of the traffic that scattered in front of me and the honking horns I left behind in my wake. Tires squealing, I slid us into a parking spot across the street from the restaurant. I could feel the anger in the quickness of my breath, in the tightness of my chest, in the white of my knuckles gripping the steering wheel. I could feel the fear that the anger was keeping at bay. I could feel the - no, stop, don't go there yet –

"I'm over two hundred years old, Ianto. I've lived longer than any human was meant to live and stay sane. I've lost lovers and wives and friends. Every single one of them. I've watched people die quickly and slowly, peacefully and not. I will never grow old with someone. I will never be able to promise anything beyond _their_ life, because _I will go on._ I always go on, no matter how many times I've died, no matter how I've died. I will never have that _one great love_ that everyone wants, because I have too much time. Do you get it? Too much time! And I'm miserable. I'm so fucking miserable that I grasp at any opportunity for normalcy, for love, because I know exactly how short life is."

I took a deep breath before continuing, still not looking at him, still staring at my hands on the steering wheel. "Everyone who's known my secret had left me. Did you know that? Not died, but _left_. Walked out the door, not even a 'see you later,' never heard from again. The last woman I let myself love took our daughter - _my _daughter - with her. She said I was a _danger_ to our daughter because I couldn't die or age." I flexed my fingers on the steering wheel.

"And then I met you, after _decades_ of meaningless sex, and we make love because that's all you know how to do, and I loved it, and wanted more, and what am I supposed to do now, Ianto? I shied away from that kind of thing for so long because I knew what it would do to me. It would break me, because you'll die, too, and it'll be sooner than I want, and I've lost so many people, and I don't know if I can lose another, and I'm _so fucking lonely! _

"So forgive me if I get a little _worried_ about you not being where I thought you'd be," I finally snarl, looking up at him through the tears I only then realized I was shedding.

Ianto stared at me, his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open. Clearly, he'd never thought about the consequences of my "condition," as he'd so aptly called it the night we got together. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry. I didn't think…"

He held me, then, and we both cried, and kissed, and apologized, and eventually calmed down enough to only be an hour late for our dinner reservation.


	12. Chapter 12

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 12**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: It's Gay Pride Day in my city, so this chapter is dedicated to all those who are LGBTQI, whether they're out or not. It's not always easy, but things are getting better around the world, and one day we will be able to stand strong, and it won't matter who we love, because my love doesn't change yours, and in the end, love is just that. Love.

Warning: There's no plot in this chapter, just 'togetherness,' though Jack does have a revelation. Probably not the kind of thing you'd want your boss to read over your shoulder. Enjoy!

.

Ianto got jealous when I flirted with the hostess who seated us. He got even more jealous when the waiter flirted with me and I flirted back. Then there was the girl who filled our water glasses, and the bartender who sent free drinks, and the runner from the kitchen who delivered our dinner, and the waiter again, who was just checking to see if we were enjoying our meal. After the manager came and practically offered herself to us on a silver platter for a threeway, I knew he was at his boiling point. Ianto was a man who didn't like to share lovers, though we'd agreed that it was a possibility. I suspect that seeing all the flirting right there in front of him is what made him so reactive that day, not to mention my emotional outburst earlier. We were both still recovering, and my way was to flirt with everyone, while his was to focus all his energy on me.

Catching and holding his eyes, I showed him exactly what I was in the mood for with my index finger and a dollop of whipped cream off his tiramisu. He turned beet red. I winked.

"Behave!" he hissed, kicking my shin under the table. "Or don't you want to be able to fuck me in the back alley before we go back to yours?" he asked sweetly.

"Kinky boy," I drawled, licking the last of the cream from my finger. "Just the kind of man I want to take home with me." His breath caught in his throat and he swallowed several times. I repeated the procedure with the whipped cream, slower this time, and with more tongue. His ears were practically on fire. His pheromones saturated the air around the table and I drank them up.

"Be out there by the time I'm back from the loo," he growled, slipping away from the table. I laughed as he sidestepped around the over-enthusiastic manager, though I noticed that he _did _take an extra long look at her breasts. They were even more on display than when she was at our table, and she'd put on fuck-me heels and a low-hanging pendant that was seconds away from getting lost in her cleavage. Grinning, I tossed a pile of notes on the table and stood.

"Maybe next time," I purred in her ear as I passed her on my way out the front door. "Make sure you give him your number," I added with a wink, letting my lips brush the edge of her ear ever so slightly. She had a silent but very satisfying orgasm right there in the middle of the restaurant as I trailed my hand over her pert little arse in its tight skirt. Oh, yes, Ianto and I could have fun with her… Between that arse and those legs and that tiny little mole by the corner of her lips… Yes, we could have lots of fun with her… And did I mention her breasts…?

My pheromones were just as airborne as Ianto's and much more potent, and between mine and his, there would be a lot of people shagging tonight just from being in our presence. _A lot _ofshagging, if I read the signs correctly, which I did. I could already see men and women reaching for their wallets, several women fanning themselves, and quite a few men shifting uncomfortably in their chairs, as if they suddenly felt _confined_. I watched a pair of women flirting at the bar, then linking hands and moving to follow me outside. They turned away and hurried off, giggling and trying to kiss at the same time.

In the alley, Ianto directed me to stand against the wall while he knelt in front of me. He made sure both of us were hidden by shadows. Not that I cared, but I didn't see a reason to argue when he was about to blow me. He started slowly, just licking me in long swipes, getting used to the unusual position we were in, getting used to being outside.

"Is this what you wanted?" he asked softly, deepening his accent the way I loved. Not waiting for my answer, he enveloped me in his mouth, taking me all the way. God, he was good at this! I swear he got better each time, and this was outstanding! I knew I wouldn't be able to hold back for very long. I tugged gently on his hair to get his attention, but he swatted my hand away. He did something particularly agile with his tongue and I was gasping, punching the wall behind me to keep from coming.

"Ianto, stop! I'm not going to last —"

He released my cock from his mouth and smiled up at me. "Oh, I think you're up to the task, _sir_," he rumbled, and before I could do anything about it, I came all over his face. We stared at each other for a moment as I felt my cheeks heat in embarrassment. That was twice now he'd made me come when I didn't expect it. What was going on with me? Where was my control? What was so special about him that he could do this to me, not once, but two times?

"Well," Ianto huffed. "That didn't feel nearly as degrading as I expected it to," he commented as he wiped his face clean with a handkerchief. "A little warning would be good for next time, yeah?"

"Ianto —"

"Shut up and kiss me," he ordered, standing. We stood there, pressed together and just kissing, for a long time. His erection dug into my hip. Every time I tried to touch him, he pushed my hands away. I was growling in frustration when he pulled his mouth away to let us speak again. "Are you ready to fuck me yet?" he asked, tugging on my cock to make sure it was hard again, which it was, and had been for almost as long as we'd been kissing. He knew my recovery time, though, and we both knew he was teasing. We'd certainly enjoyed the kissing, hadn't we?

I gave him one of my best smiles. "Are you ready to be fucked?" I countered. "I'm hungry tonight," I told him.

"The question begs, sir. Do you deserve to be allowed to fuck me?" he asked, squeezing me just a little bit too hard. "You flirted with every single person in that restaurant."

"And you have a phone number in your pocket," I informed him. He froze in surprise.

"How do you know —"

Before he could finish his question, I had him pinned face-first against the wall.

"Trousers down. Bend over." He rushed to comply.

I started with two fingers instead of one, because, really, he was already panting for me. The danger of getting caught turned him on, and the idea of being buggered in an alley behind an exclusive French restaurant, while never a fantasy of his before he met me, was now at the top of his list. And _he'd_ been the one to suggest it! My kinky boy was getting more and more adventurous, and I loved it.

He shouted out when I entered him, since I hadn't stretched him more than the two fingers, but his scent and breathing were telling me how much he enjoyed it, and he didn't tell me to stop or use his safeword, so I figured we were good to go.

He was getting louder with each thrust, and if I didn't contain him soon, we'd be discovered for sure. I shoved my hand into the pocket of my coat with the alien sterilizer in it and brought it up to his face to stroke his cheek once the cycle completed. Five seconds, not bad, if I do say so myself. You never know when you'll need your fingers for more than one task, after all.

"Either you bite my hand or I cover your mouth," I said. "Which do you want?"

"Bite," he gasped, and I shoved my hand in his mouth. He whimpered around it and bit down, hard, when I thrust again, and I didn't care that I might have teeth marks on my hand between my index finger and thumb if this is how I got them. He was shoving his arse back with each of my thrusts, angling for the best fit, for the most pleasure, for me to hit his prostate over and over. I held him steady with my other hand on his hip.

"More. Harder," he begged, his head hanging low between his shoulders as he held himself up. "Hard as you can!" I obliged. I'm nothing if not a gentleman when it comes to sex.

He came all over the alley wall. I came deep inside him.

.

.

.

_Ianto's eyes are blue. Not just any blue, they're the blue of the sky above the Boeshane Peninsula just after dawn when I would run along the ocean looking for adventures. They're the blue of the sky when a storm was brewing. They're the blue of the water at mid-day when I would swim and surf. And, most importantly, they're the blue of everything that's ever been good in my life. _

_Did I mention that I love blue? _

_Did I mention that I love Ianto's eyes? _

_Did I mention that I love __Ianto__?_

_I love Ianto__. _

_There, I said it. Ten days after meeting him, nine days after we first kissed and fucked and slept in the same bed, and I said it. To myself, at least. _

_It's too early. Too early for everything. Too early to tell him, certainly. He just lost his girlfriend — maybe his fiance — and I've been in this century long enough to know that there will likely be a __very big reaction_ _when he finally gets around to mourning her, when the novelty of having sex with me wanes and he realizes that he's just spent however long fucking someone else before she was even buried. People in this time don't see relationships and sex the way I do, and I've spent years learning the rules that are so different from the ones I soaked up just by living as a child in my own time. _

_He'll probably leave me because he feels guilty, and I don't like it, but I wouldn't blame him. I wouldn't stop him, either, though I'd put up a fight if he didn't seem completely determined to do it. He's a product of his time just as much as I'm a product of mine. No use crying over spilled milk, as the saying goes. No use crying over milk that hasn't even been spilled yet, especially since there's always the possibility of him coming back to me after he mourns her. _

_So what do I do when I'm staring into Ianto's eyes as we make love, feeling this emotion that will get me into all kinds of trouble if I express it? When I'm moving inside him, rocking into him slowly and carefully, drawing out every last ounce of pleasure, knowing I'm doing it for him first, and not me? _

_Simple. I do the only thing I can do to show him how important he is to me. I slip out of him and settle down on his cock for the first time. His eyes widen in surprise and he moans, thrusting up into me. He didn't expect the (cold) lube I slathered on him, but it's necessary, and he knows it. He's not complaining, not one little bit. I close my eyes and relish the burn I haven't felt in years, haven't felt safe enough to let myself feel with anyone. He knows it's been a long time since I've bottomed, and he's trying to be careful, even as the sensations overwhelm him. _

_He's just the right size, I realize, filling me to bursting without actually bursting anything. I didn't bother to stretch myself, just wanting to feel him inside me. I must be so tight. It's a wonder he's still holding on, but that's Ianto for you. A wonder. I feel him throbbing, so I give him an experimental squeeze. _

"_Oh, fuck!" he exclaims. "Oh, God!" His instincts are good, like they've been all along, and he finds my prostate quickly. (It helps that I'm sitting on him while he's on his back, so I can control things a little more than in other positions, but for now I let him have his success and don't mention it. He probably knows, anyway, what with all the research he's done this last week.) _

_And so I learn his reactions to this new kind of sex, even as I teach him with mine, and we find a rhythm, and he's coming and I'm coming and we're both breathless and sweaty and he's coming again because I gave him one last squeeze and he's laying his head back and passing out, barely able to kiss me, but we manage, because there's no way I'm letting him fall asleep after that without at least a kiss and he calls me __cariad_ _as he dozes off, and I've been in Wales long enough to know what that means, so I let myself get carried away by joy and hope and I fall into a deep, dreamless sleep of my own, more contented and happy than I can remember being since I arrived on this blasted planet. _

.

.

.

I woke up the morning after our date at the restaurant to the glorious ache of being loved in just the right way. Ianto was smiling in his sleep, and believe me, the only reason I left him that day was because the Queen called me.


	13. Chapter 13

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 13**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Here is a chapter in which we speak with some of the Torchwood team. Enjoy!

.

"So, Harkness, will I need to test you for alien influences?" Owen asked over lunch. I gave him a questioning look. "You've been acting strange lately."

"Happy," Tosh commented, her eyes glittering. She was the only one who knew I was sleeping with Ianto.

"You've been whistling," Suzie added. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were on another of your club crawl binges."

"He hasn't had time for that," Owen said, glaring at her. The tension between them was much higher than usual lately, and I wondered if that meant their affair was over. I'd have to ask Tosh. She watched Owen more closely than anyone, so she'd probably know.

"He didn't have the time for it last time it happened, either, and yet he was out getting laid every single night for three months!" Suzie protested.

"As a matter of fact —"

"Still, it's not normal, even for Jack on one of his shag binges," Owen declared, interrupting me. "He's got more energy, more patience, and he's not telling as many stupid stories. Last time he told _more_ stories."

"We did get the run-down every morning, didn't we?" Suzie mused. "Maybe you're right. It's aliens. I don't think there's been a story all week!"

"You know, I'm right here," I said. "You could just ask me."

"Well?" Owen asked obediently. "What's the deal?"

"Actually, I've been seeing someone," I declared proudly. I think Owen's jaw hit the table. Suzie stared at me as if I were a monster. Tosh giggled. I smiled at her, remembering her giggle from the night I met Ianto and I asked her to look into him for me. "His name's Ianto Jones."

"That stalker from Torchwood London?" Suzie growled. "How stupid can you be? He's obviously sleeping with you to get information or something!"

"Of course he is," I replied. "It doesn't mean I don't enjoy his company. It doesn't mean he shags any less well."

"So, let me get this straight," Owen said, gesturing with his fork. "You're sleeping with this bloke, even though you know he probably has some kind of nefarious plot against you or us? Are you nuts?"

I shrugged. "We don't talk about Torchwood, if it makes you feel any better. Both Tosh and I did full background checks on him, and she monitors his computer and mobile."

"You're in on it?" Owen asked Tosh. She blushed and nodded.

"Jack's really cute when he talks about Ianto," she offered into the room.

Suzie rolled her eyes. "Have you got a picture?" I grinned and pulled out my mobile. "Well, at least your taste in men isn't hampered by your lack of judgment about their morals. He's a bit of all right, isn't he?"

"And he's all mine!" I told her, snatching the phone back. "None of you can touch him!"

Owen laughed. "Not into guys, remember? You can keep him. I still want to check you for influences, though. What if he has some kind of tech that's affecting you? Or an alien aphrodisiac?"

"I would know."

"Med bay in one hour, Harkness," Owen growled, stalking from the room. "You might be our leader, but you're not immune to everything, and I trump your authority in this."

"Fine," I agreed uncharitably.

"Your good mood lately is because of this guy?" Suzie asked.

"I really like him," I answered honestly. "He knows what I do without having to be a part of it. It's refreshing to have just one person in my bed rather than stranger after stranger."

"You've only been with him? For how long?"

"Two weeks."

"Huh. I didn't think it was possible for you to be faithful for that long," Suzie muttered to herself. She gathered her rubbish and stood.

"You don't really know me, Suzie," I replied.

"Well, don't come crying to all of us when it goes tits up," she said, striding out of the conference room. I stared at her back, surprised. Suzie wasn't usually that callous.

"She's just jealous you're happy," Tosh said, putting a hand on one of mine. "She and Owen split up two days ago, and they were never actually _happy._"

"Do you think I'm making a mistake to keep seeing him?" I asked her, turning to look at her expression.

"Well, you're going into it knowing he has secrets and that he probably has a reason to get close to you that has to do with more than your obvious attractions. You're aware that he's altered his school records, and that he's former Torchwood London. Did you have any luck getting the psych records yet?"

"No, but my contact said he'd have them for me by the end of the day. We have a meeting at six."

"Give it another few weeks. If he doesn't break down and tell you what's going on, you might have to consider other options."

"You think he'll come to me?"

"If he cares about you even half as much as you think he does, he'll come to you. From all you've said, he seems like an honest, genuine guy. It's probably hard to keep whatever it is to himself, especially if it involves doing something against you."

"I just hope whatever it is isn't too much for us to handle," I said with a sigh. "It must be pretty bad for him to stalk me for a job like he did. And I doubt he's given up on that idea. I have a feeling he'll ask again."

"So give him a job and watch him extra closely. That'll flush out his secrets." She gathered her own rubbish, then reached over to gather Owen's. He'd left it on the table, of course.

"I can't keep sleeping with him if he's working for me."

"Why not?"

"I'd lose my objectivity. It could get people hurt."

"That makes sense. We're going to need to know what his agenda is. Both for Torchwood, and for you as a person. Do you really want to be worrying about his hidden agenda when you're in bed with him?"

"Definitely not."

"So wait for the psych records, put him off about the job as long as you can, then hire him and solve the mystery. Assuming it isn't something that will destroy the world, you should be fine. You forgave my treason. Hopefully his won't be too much different."

"Have I told you lately how much I love you, Tosh? You're a genius. I don't know why you're not my second in command."

"Because UNIT would declare war on you _and_ I refuse," she answered. "Now go. I'll finish cleaning in here."

.

.

.

"Intra-psychic influence," Owen declared, pointing at a scan of my brain. "See here, and here? He's sending very subtle 'trust me' vibes, and your brain is sucking them up."

"Trust me vibes?" I asked.

"I've read about it. Low level empaths send out certain vibes without being conscious of it, like 'trust me' or 'I'm invisible' or 'I'm hot so you want to shag me.' Each one activates a different part of the brain of the recipient, and the one he's sending out is 'trust me.' The literature says that the more powerful empaths can do it consciously. From his T1 records, he's not likely to be powerful enough to be doing it on purpose, but it's still there and happening. I'd watch myself with him, if I were you."

"But he might not be aware he's doing it?" I clarified, feeling the need to defend him.

"No, he might not be. But if he's got an agenda, which we all seem to agree he has, it could get sticky."

"Hmm," I mumbled. "I _have_ been lax with my mental shielding the past few weeks. I just don't feel I need it as much with him."

"That's the influence talking," Owen said, turning back to his station. "Make your shields stronger when you're around him and see if you trust him as much."

"Huh," I mused, my brain moving very quickly through various possible scenarios. "I'll, um, I'll see you tomorrow," I said vaguely. "Suzie! You're in charge for the rest of the day. Send them home at the usual time and call me only if there's an emergency," I told her as I climbed the steps from the medical bay. I grabbed my coat and headed for the cog wheel door. It was only three, and I had several hours to wait before I could meet with my contact, but I needed to clear my head.

I stepped out of the tourist office door and walked a few meters away to lean against the railing overlooking the water. I thought about the past two weeks since I met Ianto and analyzed everything we said to each other, everything we did.

Was Ianto encouraging me to trust him using his latent empathic powers? Yes. Looking back, I could see the influences. Did he have a hidden agenda that involved Torchwood? Yes. Did his agenda involve hurting me? No, I didn't think so. Did it involve hurting humanity in general, or the planet? No, he wasn't that kind of man. He was too selfless to even think of such a thing. Which meant that his agenda was personal.

Personal agendas could get messy.

Was he sleeping with me only to get what he wanted, or were there actual feelings involved? Did he really want to sleep with me, or was it just an act? No, it wasn't an act. He called me cariad in his sleep last night, randomly, not after a shag, and he used my name, so I knew he was talking to me. He cared for me, and I could see it in how he took care of me, in how he looked at me, in how much joy I saw in his eyes when he woke up next to me, or saw me at the end of the day for the first time when I got back to the flat after work.

Was there more to Ianto Jones than meets the eye? Yes. Was I willing to risk the fall out of his plans? Again, yes.

I just hoped my love would be enough to see us through the bad times ahead of us.


	14. Chapter 14

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 14**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Here we have the chapter that follows alongside 'Ianto Wakes, Chapter 4,' if you want to read them side by side and see what a difference a point of view is. Enjoy, and please let me know what you think.

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Ianto wasn't in the kitchen when I got back to my flat, psych records in hand. Nor was he in the sitting room. I slid the folder under the cushions of the sofa. He wouldn't look there, and I'd finish reading them once he was asleep. The first half of the file was enough for now, and my insight into the mind of one Ianto Jones was much more complete, though I knew there was more yet to discover.

"Jack?" Ianto called, and I could tell he was in the bedroom. I smiled. No need to focus on his psychology when I could lose myself in his body.

Stepping into the bedroom, I stopped short. Ianto lay stretched out on burgundy sheets. The silk was draped across his body in such a way as to cover his groin, though I could tell he was excited to see me by the outline of his erection. Candles cast a gentle glow around the room.

"Red is your color," I said hoarsely, my own arousal building. His pale skin was accentuated by the color, and I itched to run my fingers along his body.

"Come to bed," he whispered, beckoning me forward. I shucked off my clothing and joined him. We kissed and caressed each other for a long time, both wanting to take things slowly. The silk felt wonderful against my skin, and I wondered where he'd gotten it. It wasn't in _my_ linen closet, that's for sure. Not that I cared where he'd gotten it when he was sucking on my neck and my hands were massaging his back and arse. "I'd like to try something," he said softly in my ear. "Get on your hands and knees."

I shivered in anticipation. Ianto had shagged me twice more since the first time, but not from this position, and now that I felt comfortable with him taking me, I was ready for a good pounding. Face-to-face is excellent, but sometimes the classic poses are the way to go. He got on his knees behind me and stroked my arse. He parted my cheeks.

Suddenly his breath was hot on my opening and his tongue touched me hesitantly. I couldn't help the sigh that escaped my lips. Here was Ianto, rimming me for the first time. I groaned as he became more bold, though I resisted the urge to push back. He probably wasn't ready for that. Then his tongue breached me and we both groaned.

"Stretch me," I gasped after a few glorious minutes. "I need you inside me."

Soon he was entering me, and I couldn't think about anything as he gave me exactly what I wanted, hard and fast and deep.

"Why do I like this so much?" he asked himself afterwards, when we were curled up together catching our breath. "I mean, I liked rimming you!"

"Does it matter?" I answered, kissing his shoulder, his chest, too blissed out to concentrate on what we were saying.

"No, I suppose not," he murmured. I was almost asleep when he spoke again, my earlier resolve to stay up and read his psych file disintegrated under the onslaught of great sex. "When are you going to give me a job?" he asked.

"I'm not," I answered, yawning. I snuggled closer against him.

"I can't keep staying here, Jack. I need a place of my own. I need an income."

"I'll get you a flat. I'll give you a stipend," I offered without thinking, just wanting to take care of my beautiful Welshman, wanting to protect him. "As much as I'd pay you working for me."

"I'm not a whore," he growled angrily, and I realized how my offer must have sounded.

"Of course you're not a whore!" I shouted, getting out of bed, angry at myself for the misunderstanding. I remembered something from his file: _Ianto has a lot of pride about being self-sufficient because of the lack of money in his house when he was growing up. He is intensely ashamed of his past as a teen pickpocket, and he works hard to dispel that guilt for those he hurt. Nameless crimes aren't without victims, he says. _

I paced around the room, angry for his painful past, angry that I couldn't help him without making him feel dirty. All I wanted was for him to be healthy and happy and in my bed. Shit, I would fuck it all up if I mentioned anything about of his psychology. He'd know I read his files that he worked so hard to hide, and in the middle of an argument wasn't the time to have the conversation when I tell him I've been reading up on him. I defaulted to the most primary reason I didn't want him on staff, my lover or not.

"That's not what I – Damn it, Ianto! You'd get hurt working for me. I don't want you hurt."

"I know the risks. I've lived through them. I still want to work for you."

"Why?" I demanded, needing to understand, hoping he would use the opportunity I was giving him to come clean about what he was hiding. I thought of the horrors of Canary Wharf, and what he must have lived through. I thought of his nightmares, his lost friends and co-workers, all the blood and death he'd seen.

"Why what?"

"Why would you willingly want to work for me after all they've done? Why would you put yourself in that position again?"

"Because I need to, for Lisa, for the others that died."

There it was, Lisa. The elephant in the room, the dead girlfriend/fiance. We'd never talked about her. I didn't know anything about her, except from her Torchwood file. Well, that's not quite true. I read her school records, her psych records. She was a normal young woman. She went to counseling in Uni after a boyfriend dumped her. She didn't have any red flags about her of any kind, though not in the way Ianto didn't have any. His lack of red flags was a red flag in and of itself, while hers was about being average. _She's not average to him, _I reminded myself. _She's very important to him. But I can't let either of us get sidetracked. I can't let him work for me. _

"Survivor's guilt?" I finally asked, watching his reactions.

"I'm one of 27 survivors, Jack. They were my friends. Lisa was my girlfriend. I want to honor their memory by keeping up the work, by doing good in their names."

"I'm still getting you a flat," I decided, his pride be damned. "You can't stay here. It's too small, too cramped. I want you to have your things with you. Because you're _not_ a whore, or a kept man, or anything like that. I respect you. You have choices in this."

"I don't want a flat. I want a job! That's my choice."

"I can't give you a job and keep this up, Ianto," I said, letting some of my sadness seep out in my voice. I wanted him to know how I thought of him, that I would miss our intimacy, our relationship. That it wasn't just about sex. I wanted him to know I cared about him, though I couldn't yet tell him that I loved him. As I decided the other day, it was too soon for that kind of declaration.

"So let me go and give me the damned job!" he shouted. "It's just sex, Jack," he added. I didn't believe he actually felt that way, but what was I supposed to do? He was still talking, but I was barely listening, feeling the dread creeping into my heart. "You can find someone else for that. You're more than beautiful enough to have someone else in your bed tomorrow if you want. Hell, you could have someone else here within an hour of me leaving. You won't find someone who can do my job even half as well as I can, who knows the protocols, who's part of it already."

"You think I'm beautiful?" I asked, a goofy smile on my face. Ianto thought I was beautiful! I couldn't help the smile.

"You know you're beautiful," he replied.

"But I didn't know you thought that," I answered. Sure, I'm vain, and yes, I'm aware of my physical attributes, but hearing it from him warmed me. He'd heard me last week on the phone when I thought he was leaving me because he was in London. He knew I had insecurities I kept hidden from everyone, even myself, most of the time. But I had opened myself up to him to let him see that, and here we were, fighting about the job I knew I'd have to give him to find out his secret, since he hadn't taken the chance to tell me just now. At least he thought I was beautiful.

"I'm sorry, Jack. I need the job. I'm not taking no for an answer anymore."

"You'd leave me, leave this thing we have, to work for me and never have this again? You'd willingly watch me with other people?" I asked, taunting him with the idea. Maybe that would knock some sense into his head, even if I had no intention of following through on my threat. I wouldn't be able to be with anyone for a long time, after him, and I knew it. "Because that's what would happen."

"It's only been two weeks," he pointed out, and I could hear the lies in his next words. "We haven't made any promises, and I'm not going to. Your sex life is your own business. Give me a month trial. If it works out, great. If not, we can come back to this."

_Oh, Ianto, it's not that easy,_ I thought. _Not by a long shot. It'll take a lot longer to heal this breach, let me tell you. We might jump back into bed, but the intimacy? The trust? That would take a lot of time and effort to rebuild. _

"You could get a different job. Wouldn't that be all right?" I suggested.

"I'm going to work for you, Jack. I won't take any other offer."

Suddenly, my anger flared out of control. How dare he leave me? How dare he walk away from me? How dare he throw away what I was offering, especially when what I was offering was love?

"Get out," I snarled. "Your hours are seven in the morning until I decide you can go home. We'll discuss your job description in the morning." He scrambled for his clothes. "Leave the key," I told him, turning my back to him. I knew I wouldn't be back to the flat while he worked for me. Maybe never again, since it held so many memories of him. Maybe it was time to get the nice flat that I'd never thought important before now, the one I wished I'd had when Ianto was with me. If he came back to me, if his secret wasn't so horrible, maybe, just maybe, we'd get back together, then I'd want to be proud of the place I took him home to.

As soon as the front door closed, I stalked to the kitchen and grabbed his favorite mug. I smashed it against the counter, not caring that some of the shards cut me. I grabbed another mug as the anger and heartbreak and sorrow overcame me.

When I came back to myself, I was standing amid a pile of broken pottery, bleeding, with tears streaking down my cheeks. My kitchen was trashed. I swore to myself and went to take a shower. Yet another reason not to return to the flat: no plates or cups.

Once dressed, having studiously ignored Ianto's clothing in my closet, I dialed Tosh's mobile. "He's starting tomorrow," I told her, not bothering with a greeting, not caring it was the middle of the night and I might have woken her. "Seven. Can you get a profile ready for him and a program to monitor everything he does?"

"I take it he hasn't come clean?" she asked.

"He's willing to leave me to do whatever it is." I could hear the tightness of suppressed sobs in my voice.

"He left you?"

"He wouldn't take no for an answer. I suggested a different job. I offered him a flat. He didn't want any of it. He just wants to work for Torchwood, and even though I spelled it out that we couldn't continue as lovers, he still wouldn't budge. So I kicked him out. I can't risk sleeping with an employee. I just can't. I've seen Torchwood directors make too many mistakes that way, too many people died because of it. I won't let people die because of my sex life."

"Oh, Jack, I'm so sorry!"

"Yeah, whatever," I muttered. "Tell the others to be at the Hub by six for a briefing."

With a heavy heart I grabbed the few personal belongings I wanted to keep, as well as Ianto's psych report, and left the flat.


	15. Chapter 15

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 15**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Warnings for sexual themes in this chapter. Enjoy!

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Having Ianto working around the Hub was a new and strange form of torture. The reminders of his presence were everywhere. The constant stream of excellent coffee, the lack of rubbish, the well-stocked kit, the fact that we didn't forget meals because he provided them, all were improvements over the norm. He was right, in that he did an excellent job as a general support officer/butler. All my clothes were clean, and once the others left he cooked for me, though we'd stopped eating together. I couldn't look at him and not want him, and that was just too awkward to deal with.

I even allowed him to start organizing the Archives, and he spent a significant amount of time down there, though I think some of that was to avoid the rest of us. Tosh was neutral, warming to Ianto because of his innate personality, but still cold, because of how he hurt me. Owen and Suzie were especially mean to him, demanding he complete all kinds of demeaning tasks, even after I reamed out Owen for humiliating Ianto during his induction physical. I hadn't bargained on that, and I felt embarrassed I hadn't noticed that he had Ianto sit through the entire two hours completely naked, when it was really only needed for the last few minutes. But I was avoiding Ianto that day, which is a poor excuse at best, so I hadn't realized what was going on until I heard Owen asking for a sperm sample. God, how inappropriate is _that_? I had to intervene. The next day, Owen was back to his usual snarky self, giving Ianto shit for just about everything.

And then there was me.

I hadn't slept more than an hour at a time since I kicked him out of my flat. Normally, this wouldn't have bothered me, but I'd gotten used to five or six hours when he slept next to me, so I was irritable. I was also miserable. I missed him. I missed the sex. I missed being able to talk to him. I missed the potential for something good we'd been growing. I missed having that non-Torchwood support. I missed knowing I had someone who cared about me as _me_. Seeing him just made me remember what we could have had, and it made me angry that he would give it up.

It made me angry that I let this happen. At some level, I'd given up, too, and I hated that. I hated that I let my job come between me and the first real chance for happiness I'd had in many, many years. I briefly contemplated sleeping with him while he worked for me, but I couldn't wrap my head around being more scared for his safety as my lover than if he were just an operative. Not that I was letting him out in the field, mind you, but it was the theory behind it all. Despite all that, I had Suzie give him weapons training, just in case. She smirked at me when I asked, commenting that he would probably be the only one who would enjoy my special brand of training, but I glowered at her and she went on her way.

I snapped and snarled at Ianto. I found fault with what he did. I avoided being alone with him, because I knew that if we were alone, my attraction and desire for him would take over, no matter how good my intentions. I think he was waiting for that.

To be honest, so was I.

On his eighth day, I couldn't stand it anymore and followed him down to the Archives to watch him working. He didn't know I was there, so he started when he turned from the filing cabinet and saw me leaning against the far wall.

"Jack!" he exclaimed.

"That's Captain," I corrected him, again, for the thirtieth time this week, as I walked forwards. To his credit, he held his ground until I was a foot away from him, already in his personal space. Then he backed up against the cabinet. I followed.

"Captain," he whispered, licking his lips. He watched me warily as I put both my hands on either side of his head. I pressed my body against him, trapping him. His breathing hitched. I leaned closer so that my breath ghosted over his face.

"Do you miss fucking me?" I asked in a ragged purr.

"Yes," he said, swallowing nervously. "Captain," he added as an afterthought. I felt a jolt of electricity run from my head all the way down my spine to my cock.

"Do you miss having me fuck you?"

"Yes, Captain," he repeated. I could hear the smile in his sultry voice. He knew what calling me 'captain' was doing to me, despite me having ordered him to call me that on his first day because him calling me 'Jack' like the rest of them did turned me on. (Him calling me 'sir' and 'captain' had the same effect. Was there nothing he could call me that wouldn't have my cock jumping in anticipation?)

I could feel his arousal, just as he could undoubtedly feel mine. I tilted my head, teasing him, refusing to kiss his lips. I kissed my way down his jaw, nuzzled his neck. He sighed. I kissed behind his ear. He let out a small moan.

"Do you want me?" I asked.

"Yes, Captain!"

I captured his mouth in a heated kiss. He responded instantly, grabbing me around the waist and pulling me close against him. I grabbed his hair in one hand and pulled head back so I could lick and suck at his Adam's apple. He thrust his hips against me. I started kissing him again.

"You want me to take you right here?" I growled between kisses.

"Yes, Captain!"

It seemed to be the only thing he could say, and it was exactly what I wanted to hear. I turned him around to face the cabinets. He dropped his trousers and boxers and bent over in the short time it took me to take a step back and open my fly. I stroked his gorgeous arse. His buttocks twitched at the touch. I smiled and lent over him to kiss the back of his neck. He moaned, pushing back against me.

"You want my cock?" I asked. "You want me to fuck you?"

"Yes, Captain!"

I rubbed my erection along his crack, glorying in how responsive he was. His breathing was becoming erratic. I could smell our pheromones in the air.

"Ask me," I growled.

"Please fuck me, Captain," he asked instantly.

"Say my name."

"Jack," he breathed, his voice quavering.

"Ianto," I responded.

"Please, Jack. Please fuck me!" he begged. I stroked his arse again, lovingly. I pressed the head of my cock against his opening. "Please," he whimpered. "Please."

I pulled away and slapped his arse as hard as I could. "You should've taken the flat!" I growled angrily, zipping up my fly and turning away. He collapsed to the floor, sobbing, and the sound followed me out of the Archives. I can't remember a time when I was more angry at myself in my entire life, walking away from him like that.

There are a lot of things I feel guilty about. Things I've done, people I was supposed to protect who died, cons I'd played, but this was worse than all of that. As I walked away from him that evening, I felt ashamed for what I'd done, for causing him that kind of pain just because he'd hurt me. That wasn't the man I wanted to be. That wasn't the kind of lover, or potential no-longer-an-ex-lover, I wanted to be.

I stormed out of the Hub without another word to anyone and found a roof to stand on and contemplate my city, my life, the mess I'd made of things with Ianto. _If I want him to come back to me after this month trial is over, _I thought to myself, _This is __not_ _the way to go about it! _

But what was?


	16. Chapter 16

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 16**

**by Gracefultree**

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It was the middle of the night. Dark. I was alone in the park with an alien I'd never seen before. It was long past when any of the others would be at the Hub, so I left my building-top to hunt this thing when the alert came to my wrist-strap.

The hunt wasn't going well. For me, anyway. I lay on the ground, struggling to keep it from killing me, watching its huge mouth opening to show me all fifty-seven of its teeth. Yes, 57. I counted. It also had four legs and two arms and a tail, with mottled brown skin, but the teeth were the real problem at the moment. If it killed me, I knew it would leave and go after the rest of Cardiff. Not a good thing.

I managed to reach my comms, activating them on the unlikely event that Tosh or Suzie were working extra late because of their special projects. The call connected.

"Bute Park," I gasped as the alien grabbed my head. "Bring the big guns!" There was a sickening crunch as the creature snapped my neck.

Darkness.

Pain.

More pain than usual when I resurrect.

It turns out that the creature decided _not_ to go terrorize Cardiff, because it had me right there. It was digging through my intestines, dragging them out of my body searching for something. Probably my liver. There are a lot of aliens that love human liver, the way we eat chicken or duck liver. This seemed to be one of them. I tried to concentrate my strength so I could make a break for it or reach my gun, which I'd dropped when it tackled me. I gritted my teeth and decided to wait out another death so I could come back while it was enjoying its delicacy and take it out.

I felt dizzy and lightheaded from loss of blood, so I knew I wouldn't last long.

In the distance, I heard the shriek of the SUV pulling up to a quick stop, the door opening and slamming closed, and a very loud, very angry, very _Welsh_ voice screaming.

"Get away from him!"

The whine of our best plasma rifle and the heat of its ray pulsed over my head, and the alien fell back, its shoulder exploded off. I could hear it twitching, but my main concern was the darkness creeping into my vision again. Shit, I was going to die with my entrails still out in the open. That meant at least one, if not two or three, more deaths.

I came back to life to the feeling of cracked ribs and Ianto doing chest compressions on me. As I gasped through the pain, he broke off the CPR and hauled me into a hug. He was crying.

"Jack!" he choked, and I could hear the relief in his voice. I tried to move, but he held me too tightly. My neck ached.

"Did… call… Owen…?" I managed to ask around the pain.

"No, um, shit, no, I didn't…" he rambled, lying me back down. "I'll do it now."

"Don't," I said. "Stay…"

"OK, Jack, I'll stay with you." He glanced down at my abdomen and paled, but looked back to meet my eyes. "You're going to be OK, Jack. You're going to be fine."

"How… bad?" I asked.

"Not bad, really," he reassured me. I laughed, choking briefly on a little blood in my mouth. "Just try to relax. You're going to heal, won't you? That's what your file said."

I grimaced. "Put … back," I whispered. "Makes… easier," I told him. His eyes widened.

"You want me to put your organs back in your body?" he asked, and though it was dark, I could see him turning green at the thought. I made an affirmative noise. "Shit. Um, OK. Um, it's been a long time since my A-levels," he muttered, opening the med kit he'd brought with him from the SUV. "I'm not sure what goes where…" he trailed off as he donned gloves.

"General… place OK," I told him. "Cover… then wait."

"Cover with a gauze or something?"

"Yeah… quickly…"

"Are you going to die again?" he squeaked, and I could hear the raw fear in his voice. He started working, and I almost blacked out from the pain. "Jack, stay with me," he called.

"Had… worse… from… shaving…"

"Jack!"

I gasped back to life much more painfully than usual. It was a bad night. My ribs felt fine, and my neck would feel better once I got a chance to stretch and crack it, but my abdomen was on fire. I felt a slight prick, then a burning and the warm blush of one of Owen's best painkillers flooding my veins. I let out a little sigh of relief. Ianto appeared at my head, looking concerned, so I gave him a small smile.

"Your skin's whole," he reported. "I don't know how you do it, but it's all better."

"The insides are still working themselves out," I muttered. "I might have to die again to get everything back in place."

"Oh, Jack, I'm so sorry!"

"Help me up," I croaked. Together we got me on my feet and staggered over to the SUV, where I sat in the passenger's seat and drifted on a haze of painkillers while Ianto cleaned up the site and put the dead alien in the boot. I woke a little when he turned on the car and started driving.

"I'll get you upstairs to your flat, then I'll take this thing back to the Hub," he said as he drove. "Do you want company tonight? I can come back and sit with you, or sleep on the couch. You shouldn't be alone if you're still hurting."

"Just take me to the Hub," I told him.

"You'd be more comfortable in a bed," he protested. "That cot you have in your bunker doesn't look comfortable."

"It's fine," I answered curtly. "Besides, I sold the flat."

"You sold the flat?" He turned to look at me in surprise.

"It was too painful to think of going back there without you," I confessed, turning my head away so I wouldn't have to see his reaction. The medicine was making me more honest than I would have liked to be, and I knew I'd have to do some damage control with him in the morning.

"It hurts that we're not together anymore?" he asked after thinking about what I said for a moment.

"Of course!" I exclaimed. "Why do you think I can't be in the same room with you for more than a few minutes? Why do you think I can't keep my eyes off you whenever you're around? Why do you think I pulled that shit in the Archives this afternoon? I'm fucking miserable!"

"Oh," he whispered, falling silent. Could it be that he thought I was all right with this imposed distance? That I was just trying to punish him for rejecting me?

Things became even more confusing when we reached the Hub, because instead of dropping me and the alien corpse off and going home, Ianto sealed the alien in a drawer for Owen for the next day and followed me down into my bunker, gathered up the destroyed clothing I dropped behind me as I stripped, took off his own clothing, and got into the shower with me. There was nothing sexual about it. He washed my back and hair, then made sure I wouldn't fall as I took care of washing the rest of me. There was a lot of blood, and other fluids, and the water ran pink for a while.

Afterwards, he dried me off and tucked me into bed in my cot, wrapping an extra blanket around me. He sat on the edge of the bed and looked down at me, and I was struck by how young he was. He reached out and stroked my cheek with the back of his hand.

"Do you want me to stay?" he asked.

I shook my head. "Just give me another dose of that medicine and let me sleep it off. Everything will be back to normal tomorrow."

Ianto disappeared up the ladder to my office and returned with the syringe. "Goodnight, Jack," he whispered when he'd finished administering it. "I'll see you in the morning, yeah?"

"Goodnight, Ianto," I replied softly. He leaned over and kissed my forehead.

"I hope you feel better," he added.

Ten minutes later my vortex manipulator told me that he had left the Hub. I yawned and tried to think about what would happen in the morning, but my mind was muddled with painkillers, so I allowed myself to drift off.


	17. Chapter 17

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 17**

**by Gracefultree**

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.

I climbed out of my bunker at eight in the morning, dressed and feeling mostly recovered from my nighttime 'adventures.' I sat at my desk, and the first thing I noticed was a typed report in the center of my blotter. I picked it up and began reading. Ianto, who'd never been in the field before, had written a flawless field incident report, with the additional ballistics report for using the plasma riffle. He'd done an excellent job and I was impressed. I was even more impressed at how he worded the situation, since he couldn't very well put in that I died, and even saying I was wounded would set off alarm bells for Owen, should he happen to see the report. He was keeping my secret, as I knew he would. I might not trust everything about him, but I knew he was honest about that. I signed off on the report and dropped it into my outbox.

I reached for the next item from my inbox. Having Ianto around was definitely a good thing for organization. He sorted and prioritized all my paperwork before putting it in my inbox, and that way I could deal with the most important things first. It also made going through it faster, so I could spend more time doing the things I preferred, like chasing aliens or rebuilding tech with Tosh and Suzie.

The smell of coffee preceded Ianto as he walked into my office a few minutes later. I gave him a half-smile, not sure where we stood in terms of how we were treating each other. A lot happened the last 24 hours, most of it my fault, and I was confused, to say the least. No doubt he was as well.

"Morning, Captain," he said. I tensed. We were back to 'captain.' Him calling me by my name yesterday must have been a fluke because he was worried about me. I shook off the unease and put on one of my usual smiles.

"Ianto, good morning," I said, accepting the coffee he handed me. "Have a seat."

Ianto settled into his chair and sipped his coffee, sitting ramrod straight. He was going to wait for me to make the first move, which shouldn't have surprised me.

"Your report was very well-written. Detailed, yet concise, without some of the random speculation the others usually add to theirs."

"Thank you, sir."

I sighed. This might be harder than I thought.

"Look, Ianto, about yesterday —"

"I'll keep your secret, Jack. You don't have to worry about that."

I gave a silent prayer of thanks that he called me Jack again. All was not lost, it seemed. He still cared about me. Of course he did, I reminded myself, he just put the job higher on his priority list.

"I know you will. I've never doubted that. I meant before that, though, in the Archives."

He looked away but didn't say anything.

"I was out of line," I told him. "It was grossly inappropriate and I apologize."

He turned back, his eyes wide in shock. "You're apologizing?" he demanded quietly, as if he never expected that.

"I'm sorry, Ianto. I let my frustrations get out of hand and I shouldn't have done that. We need to talk about things, so we can find a way to work together. What's going on now, that hasn't been working, and I think we both know it."

"What are you suggesting?"

"A truce, of sorts."

"A truce," he repeated.

"I'll talk to the others. They shouldn't be ordering you around all the time."

"No," he said firmly.

"What?"

"I said, no. If you talk to them it will make it worse for me, Jack. I've been bullied before, and I know how they'll react to that kind of thing. They'd claim I came to you and ratted them out, so I'd just get more abuse. If I keep ignoring them, they'll eventually get bored and stop."

"That's ridiculous!"

"You've never been bullied, have you? The Golden Boy, top of your class, always had your pick of lovers, always felt confident you'd get where you were going, not much effort required? Life's not been like that for me. Or for Tosh and Owen. I don't know about Suzie, but she's got something else going on. She has secrets."

"We all have secrets," I countered. "You have them."

"I'd rather not talk about mine, sir," he said, falling back to formality in the face of his own discomfort and my gentle prodding.

I ran my fingers through my hair and let out a frustrated breath as I leaned back in my chair. "I might be able to help you," I offered. "If I knew what the situation was. There's almost nothing you could do that's irreparable. And even then, there's always some leeway. Someone gave me a second chance once, and I promised to always give them to my staff. More so since you were my lover."

"I appreciate the offer, sir, and I'll be sure to let you know if I change my mind. Now, if that's all?" He rose fluidly and gathered our empty mugs. "I'll have breakfast for you in a few minutes."

And with that, Ianto left my office, his butler mask firmly back in place.

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I watched Ianto for the entire day, on the CCTV cameras around the Hub when he wasn't in eyesight, and I found out just how bad the bullying was. Tosh, having noticed my warmer treatment of Ianto when I thanked him for the coffee at our staff meeting instead of ignoring him like I'd been doing all week, tried to be friendlier, though I'm not sure if it mattered to him. Owen and Suzie had him doing all kinds of tasks that would get him dirty, or mess up his suit, or demean him. Several times I saw him check emails on his PDA and start, a look that mixed sadness, horror and resignation on his face. He caught me watching once and the butler mask quickly found its place again as he shoved the PDA back into his pocket. Whatever he was looking at disturbed him, and I wanted to know what it was, even if it meant invading his privacy.

I wondered how much longer I could wait through this Ianto-imposed month-long trial before demanding answers or fucking him. Or both. I was starting to wonder if he was a liability to Torchwood. He wasn't supposed to be in the Hub when I called the night before, yet he was. What did that mean? What had he been doing here? What shit show was I going to have to clean up after when he finally came clean or had whatever it was blow up in his face? In our faces?

My brain started coming up with scenarios and suspicions. Reasons not to trust him. Maybe now _was _the time to investigate?

Once Ianto was firmly ensconced in the Archives after lunch, I stopped at Tosh's station on my way to the cog wheel door. "Tosh, I need one of the special PDA's," I said.

She glanced up at me over the rim of her glasses. "The tracking kind?" she asked. I nodded. "About time," she muttered, rummaging in a pile of tech. "This one has all his movements since he joined us," she said, handing me a large handheld device. "I've been working on a program to follow him back to Canary Wharf to see what he's been doing since then."

"How soon until it's complete?"

"Another couple of hours. It's had some bugs, and I have a feeling he's better at computers than we thought. He might be manipulating the data."

"Let me know what you find." I patted her shoulder encouragingly and walked off.

"Jack?" she called. "Did something happen last night? You've been acting different towards him today," she said softly when I returned to her station.

"He saved me from that thing Owen's dissecting today. I think the field report is still in my outbox if you want to read it. If it's not there, he's filed it already." I sighed, remembering the sight of him bending over the file cabinet, his arse in the air, begging me to fuck him. "The man's efficient," I commented, and Tosh rolled her eyes at the innuendo in my voice. From the other side of the Hub, Suzie started laughing.

"Owen! You've got to see this!" she called, and the medic left his station to saunter over to hers and peer over her shoulder at her computer screen. I met Tosh's eyes and shrugged as Owen joined in the laughter. I left the Hub, not bothering to find out what they were looking at. It was probably some youtube video about talking animals saying cursewords, or something.

I made my way over to where Ianto was staying and stopped in shock. Rather than the standard block of flats I expected, I stood outside one of the most disreputable boarding houses I'd ever seen this side of the nineteenth century. I shrugged out of my greatcoat, glad that I was in a waistcoat so my braces wouldn't stand out any more than my outfit already did. Usually I don't mind the _out of my time_ look, but when I was going to break into my employee's flat (or room, in this case) I wanted to be less memorable. I was dressed far too well for the area, and wondered if Ianto felt this awkward when he came here after work, still dressed in one of his expensive suits. I stepped from the SUV and locked it with the special alien key chain. No way I was going to take any chances with all the tech we had inside.

His room was as clean as one of these rooms could be, which isn't saying much. The place was filthy, and no amount of scrubbing would take the stains off the walls or floor. It smelled clean, though, telling me Ianto had tried to make it habitable. I sighed. That he would stay in a place like this when I offered him a flat? When I'd get him the penthouse flat in whatever building in the city he wanted, with all the amenities and anything else he desired? I didn't understand.

I snooped in drawers and his closet. Just clothing. No books, no music, no notes or papers, and only one picture of a dark-skinned woman that I immediately recognized as Lisa. I rummaged under the mattress and searched for hidden drawers in the closet, floor and dresser. Nothing. No laptop, either, and I couldn't find his phone charger. I wondered if he brought it with him to work every day. The fancy coffee maker he'd gotten for my flat was nowhere to be seen, and I suddenly realized that he'd brought it to the Hub after I'd ordered him to get all his stuff out of the flat that first morning. No wonder the coffee was so good!

I picked up the picture frame and opened it. On the back of the photo was a date from three months ago and Lisa's name, carefully printed in Ianto's precise handwriting. I put everything back the way it had been before and sat on the bed. Something wasn't right about this. I lay back to think.

The pillow didn't smell like Ianto. The pillow didn't smell like anything but cheap detergent, a kind Ianto would never buy because it didn't clean things to his satisfaction. Ianto had never slept here. Shit! I looked through the clothes again, searched the pockets. Nothing. They _were_ his clothes, though, and I remembered him wearing several of the suits. I inhaled his scent from them and felt dizzy for a moment at the sudden flow of blood to my cock.

I sat on the bed, thinking. He came here to dress and shower, since his bath products were on the dresser, but he didn't sleep here. He had a picture of Lisa, but nothing else to remind him of her. He didn't have anything personal other than that. This was a cover.

I pulled out my PDA and began scrolling through the list of places he'd visited since he joined Torchwood. Nothing out of the ordinary. It was too neat, like this room. Sterile. Which meant there was something to find. Red flags were flying high. I called Tosh and told her to dig deeper. He was hiding something, and to be able to manipulate _her_ data to this degree, well, it was damned impressive!

Still a liability, though, until I knew what he was hiding, and I didn't want him to be a liability. I wanted him to be my lover. If I could force his hand, we could solve all this, couldn't we? It might not be his desired month-long trial, but I had the sudden insight that making him tell me would solve all of our problems.

Or make them all worse. This could blow up in my face and I'd be out a lover _and_ a butler/support officer. We'd just agreed to a truce, after all. But could I wait for him to come to me? I was growing less sure as the days passed, especially as each new bit of information made its way into the light.

Either way, sitting on the bed in the room he rented but didn't sleep in wasn't doing either of us any good.


	18. Chapter 18

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 18**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Thank you all for continuing to read! We're rapidly reaching the end-point, and I can't wait to finish so I can begin writing the sequel. I'm trying to decide if I should do it in first person, switching between Jack and Ianto's points of view for each chapter, or go back to third person... Does anyone have a strong opinion either way? I've been thinking up scenes in both perspectives.

Also, this chapter corresponds to chapter 6 of 'Ianto Wakes.'

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I returned to the Hub via one of the garage entrances, not wanting to set off the usual alarm on the cog wheel door. Coming into the main area, I noticed Suzie and Owen still hovering near her desk. Had they even moved in the last three hours?

"This has to be the funniest thing I've ever seen," Suzie said enthusiastically. "How long has it been?"

"Almost three hours," Owen told her. Neither of them noticed me as I walked over. "Didn't think it could go on that long."

"That's what the bastard deserves for hurting Jack," Suzie declared.

I had a sinking feeling I wouldn't like what I was about to see, so I braced myself as I looked at the screen.

I was running before my brain could dyigest what I'd seen. Across the Hub, down the stairs, around the corner, falling to my knees, Ianto grabbing onto me and sobbing, clinging to me while I tell him 'it's going to be OK, baby, it'll be OK,' his tears soaking my shirt but I don't care because this had all gone too far and I needed to stop it before I lost any chance of saving the situation, of saving Ianto from himself, from me, from the others. I loved this man and look what was happening to him because of me! I couldn't be any more of an asshole, a bastard… I'd lost my perspective, living so long, and I was on the cusp of losing him for good.

I tapped my comms and spoke quietly and intensely to Tosh. "Don't let those two leave and by God, turn off the cameras down here!" I clicked off and tore it from my ear to be better able to concentrate on Ianto.

As he quieted in my arms, I became aware of a strange noise. Looking around, I saw his discarded PDA. On screen was a video from last year of me having sex with some blond woman I'd picked up at a club one night. I didn't realize we'd been filmed. It wasn't the best video, and it didn't show off my attributes in the best of lights because of a bad camera angle, though it was identifiably me. I switched it off.

"Who sent you this?" I growled. He tensed in my arms, and I knew it was in reaction to my anger. He sniffed and tried to answer.

"They come anonymously," he said softly through his tears.

"They?" I demanded. "There's _more_ of this shit?" Before he could speak, I scrolled through the pictures, dozens of them, hundreds of them, all of me with various people, men and women and couples and groups, all in sexual positions of one kind or another. "What the fuck is this?" I shouted, shoving the screen in his face.

"That's your cock," he replied, a little of his usual snark creeping out in his voice despite the tears.

"I know it's my cock! Why do you have this? How did you get this? What's going on?" He just shook his head, more tears rolling down his cheeks. I struggled to calm myself. "Talk to me, darling," I said, softer, tilting his head up to meet my eyes. "What's this about?"

"As if you don't know," he muttered sarcastically, trying to look away. "Who else but you would send me that picture?" he asked. "Who else would even _have_ it?"

"I don't understand."

"You and Tosh and Owen and Suzie have been sending me these pictures all week, OK? I get it. You want to torture me for rejecting you. I get that. You've moved on to greener pastures. I get that, too. But why did you have to send that video, huh? The pictures are bad enough!"

I think my mouth must have fallen open in shock. His comments about bullying that morning suddenly made more sense. It wasn't just them ordering him around, it wasn't just me being cold. It was about actual sexual harassment, nothing like my teasing and joking. This was serious. "I didn't — Tosh didn't —"

"And how am I supposed to believe that?"

Growling, I hauled him to his feet and dragged him over to the computer console. I typed in my access codes and pulled up the email logs, the ones that couldn't be manipulated. "See here? It's only Suzie and Owen. Well, mostly Owen, but the video was Suzie. Tosh wouldn't do something like that, and I have no reason to."

"You have _every_ reason to," he protested. "I rejected you and you hate me now. What do you have to lose?"

"Damn it, Ianto, all I want is for you to quit so we can go back to how we were! We were happy. That's all I want, for us to be happy again. We're both so god-damned miserable right now, and it's eating me up inside. I don't hate you! I could _never_ hate you!"

"But we _can _be happy, Jack. We can find a way to make it work as lovers and colleagues. I _know_ we can."

I closed my eyes and let myself imagine the possibility. Living with Ianto, going in to work together every day, fucking him all over the Hub… it had a certain appeal. I remembered the fantasy life of being with him without Torchwood, without the Doctor, the terror of it, of never finding my answers.

It didn't seem so frightening now, with Ianto in so much pain. Even if I missed the Doctor while Ianto was alive, he'd come back, and I'd find him then. I could give up on my answers for the next sixty years or so. Ianto was worth it. More than worth it. I knew what I had to do.

"How long has this been going on?" I asked, my voice deadly serious. He noticed the change in my tone and responded.

"Since the first day. I've tried deleting them, but I can't. Tosh must have done something to the PDA or my email."

I sighed. "Tosh was the first person I hired," I confessed. "We worked alone together for an entire year before I hired Owen and Suzie. She's my best friend, Ianto. She just wants us to be together again. She wouldn't get involved with this kind of harassment."

"Forgive me if I don't believe you."

"I haven't slept with anyone since we parted," I blurted. "The date stamps on these pictures have been changed. Most of these people are from last year. A few from even longer ago than that."

"You're saying you haven't slept with anyone since me? I've spent this whole week thinking you're off shagging everything that moves for _nothing_?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying! I've been much too hurt to go and do that kind of thing. Besides, I didn't want to get into it if there was even a _possibility_ of getting you back when the month was up."

He let out a breath and leaned against me, relaxing slightly. "I believe you," he whispered. "I don't know why, but I believe you." I kissed the top of his head.

"We'll work this out. I'll come back, but I have to go deal with Owen and Suzie. This can't continue, and I'm not letting you deter me this time."

"All right," he agreed tiredly. The fight had gone out of him. I gave him a quick kiss and returned to the Hub where Owen and Suzie were grumbling and trying to avoid me. They knew what my temper was like, and they were in for it.

I stormed back into the main Hub, fire in my eyes and anger simmering. It wouldn't take long to boil over. I rounded on Owen and Suzie, ignoring Tosh, who was typing away at her station.

"All right, you two, what have you been doing to him and why?"

"Calm down, Jack, it's just a bit of hazing," Owen said. "You know, playing tricks on the new guy. No harm intended."

"Hazing is one thing, but this is cruel and barbaric! What were you thinking?" I shouted. "No one deserves this kind of treatment! What kind of monsters are you?"

"Come on, he's from Torchwood London," Suzie said. "They're all dogs over there. You've said so often enough."

"I don't care if he's from Torchwood London! He's a human being!" My voice was rising with each sentence, and I wasn't in the mood to control it. Her blazé attitude towards hurting Ianto was rubbing me the wrong way.

"We're just trying to protect you from getting hurt," Suzie responded. "You'd protect us from a threat, wouldn't you? We're just being protective."

"No! You're not being protective, you're being horrible! How is sending a picture of my cock protective? How did you get that anyway?"

"He showed you?" Owen asked, his face draining of color. He was starting to seem embarrassed, which was a good sign for him, but still not good enough. I knew he was a bastard most of the time, but I also knew it was a defense against the sadness and hurt of losing his fiance Katie. Underneath the anger and pain was a man who cared deeply for others, and I was surprised he had gotten so lost this last week.

"Yes, he showed me. You think I don't know what my own cock looks like?"

"He hurt you!" Suzie screamed. "He rejected you!"

"Just because he hurt me doesn't give you the right to –"

"He's hiding something!" she shouted. "He's full of secrets! He's got a plan and it's something nasty and it's going to —"

"You think I don't know that?" I interrupted. "Everyone has secrets! Of course he's going to have them!"

"Then why are you so insistent on letting this go? Why are you letting him get away with all this?"

"Because I'm falling in love with him, goddamn you!" I roared. A stunned silence followed my declaration. I continued in a quieter, calmer voice. "Look, I know he has secrets. I know he's not who he seems to be. He doesn't sleep where he says he does, and he doesn't go where our software says he's been going. I have a special bit of tech to track him more closely, but I need to be careful with how I get it on him."

I looked from one to the other of them, and back at Tosh before I continued. "I might have feelings for him, but I'm watching him, too. The only reason he's here is so I can ferret out his agenda, otherwise he'd still be at my flat, all right? I have it under control."

"So, you expect an apology?" Suzie growled, crossing her arms over her chest. "You're not getting one."

"What I _expect_ is for you to act like professionals," I growled. "No more harassment, no more hazing, nothing. I'll be watching you, too, so don't think you can get away with it again." I met her eyes and glared her down. "Now get out."

She gathered her pocketbook and walked out, not bothering to say anything to anyone, her back stiff with anger. I turned to Owen. He stood there, his shoulders slumped. His body language screamed _shame. _He knew he'd done wrong, and I thought he might be willing to make an effort to make it right again. I hoped so, otherwise I might be down a medic. As the one who'd sent more pictures, I assumed he was behind it all. How wrong I would turn out to be…

"I'll talk to him in the morning," Owen mumbled. "Didn't think it was this out of hand," he offered, not raising his head.

Tosh signed off of her workstation. "Come on, Owen, I'll buy you a drink."

I watched as they gathered their things.

"Owen, get me a psychologist for tomorrow afternoon. Go to UNIT if you have to. A woman, if possible."

"Don't you think he'd prefer a man?" Owen asked, tapping a note into his phone.

"He was abused by his father. Broke his arm when he was a kid. Not sure what else. A woman would be better." What I didn't say is that Suzie had also been abused by her father, and I wanted the psychologist to look at her, too. She'd been acting more and more out of character since Ianto arrived in my life, and red flags were flying on that rampart as well.

"I'll see to it, Jack."

I nodded and watched them walk out, then shut down the main Hub for the night and went to find Ianto. We had a conversation to finish that was long overdue.


	19. Chapter 19

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 19**

**by Gracefultree**

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Ianto was sitting exactly where I left him, on the floor of his office in the Archives. He watched me as I settled onto the floor next to him. I wasn't ready to touch him yet, not when my emotions were still so high from confronting Suzie and Owen.

"I didn't think I was being as horrid to you as you seemed," I said after a moment. "I mean, you seemed more miserable than I thought you would be, given what I was doing." I could feel the roughness in my voice from the yelling, from all the emotions in the air between us. "I thought they were just ordering you around a lot or ignoring you, like I was." _Until today, _I said silently. I couldn't help the frustration in my voice as I spoke again. I wanted to punch something, I was so upset. "God, why couldn't you have just gotten a different job?"

All I wanted was to have him safe and cared for and not a part of the insanity and hardship that is Torchwood. All I wanted was for him to be my support, my partner. My _civilian _partner. I didn't care if he worked or not, though. I just wanted him to be mine.

"Are you really falling in love with me?" he asked in a whisper.

"You heard that?" I asked, surprised and embarrassed. I knew I'd been shouting, but that he could hear me all the way down here? Wow. I was more out of control than I thought.

"All of Cardiff heard that," he told me, a bit of irony in his voice.

_Shit,_ I thought, looking down at my shoes. _Not a good way to tell him. _

"It's not how I would have wanted to tell you," I said with a sigh, deciding honesty was the order of the evening. I'd need to be honest with him if I wanted him to be honest with me. "It's not _when_ I would have told you, either. It's too soon for us to be talking about this. You just lost someone, not even a month ago. I don't want to replace her, or even try. It's not respectful of any of us. I couldn't replace her, anyway. We're different people. Besides, it's one thing to have sex before you've had time to mourn her, it's another to think about another relationship. I don't know if I've made it clear that a relationship with you is what I want. It is."

I looked over at him for a moment, then looked away. Oh God, I was babbling. I never babbled, not like this. Sure, I told rambling stories that had more twists and turns than a Raxacoricofallapatorian bloodline, but I did that on purpose, usually to amuse people or deflect away from something I didn't want to think about. This was completely different, a stream of consciousness I never would have predicted I'd speak aloud. And I was still talking!

"But it's too soon after your loss. I know that, and it's selfish to want more than sex, but I'm a selfish man," I told him. I stopped, realizing that I'd just told him that I wanted a relationship. I was moving faster and faster down a path he wasn't ready for, that I might not even be ready for… that we couldn't really contemplate until his secrets were out in the open.

"You talk like a man who knows a lot about heartbreak and losing people," he commented, and I wondered exactly how much he knew about me. He knew I traveled with the Doctor. He knew I couldn't stay dead. He knew about Emily and Alice. He knew I'd been married, because I'd blurted it out at one point when we were fighting. He knew I was _lonely. _

And we both had nightmares.

It didn't really matter, though, how much he knew at this point. He knew more of my secrets than anyone except the Doctor, and hadn't I promised myself that I'd give up on waiting for the Doctor while Ianto was alive? Didn't I want to give myself to him, wholly and completely, as long as I could?

Didn't I want to figure out his agenda, his secrets, so I could help him deal with them so he could move on to being with me again?

"Maybe I do," I said, thinking about losing him eventually and how the grief would likely overcome me. Would I go back to drinking? Would I take to drugs to numb the pain? I'd been down both those roads before, and I wasn't looking forward to either outcome, but now, sitting on the floor of the Archives with him, I couldn't imagine another option for once he was gone. It was a damned good thing my 'condition' kept me from getting addicted, or I'm sure I'd have ended up like one of my former partners at the Time Agency, always in and out of rehab. I'll run into him again sometime, I know, whether via the long road of living that long or him showing up with a working vortex manipulator. Not a future I looked forward to.

No. Stop it, Jack. Be in the present, the now. Ianto's not gone yet, and that asshole hasn't been around for a very long time. Live for _now_, not the pain that will come no matter how hard I try to avoid it. Avoiding it doesn't make it go away, and sometimes makes it worse.

"I was with her for almost two years. We met very soon into my job at the Tower," Ianto said, continuing a conversation I'd forgotten I was in the middle of.

It didn't take a genius to figure out he was talking about Lisa. "I know. I read your file."

"I was going to propose to her."

"I wondered."

So it seemed she was just a girlfriend, after all. One of my fears eased. She wasn't as important as I'd worried about. Wait, just because he hadn't proposed to her didn't mean he didn't miss her as much as if he had. It didn't mean she wasn't _important_ to him. Maybe he even felt guilty he never got the chance to propose. God, relationships were confusing! She was important to him, that's the vital part of all this, fiance or not. I had to remember that.

"I never got around to buying the ring," he said, and I caught him in a lie. I remembered the credit card charge. Why would he lie about it? Did he think I cared? (I did, but that wasn't the point.)

"I'm sorry for your loss," I said, meaning it despite everything else in my head and heart.

"Me, too."

I decided enough was enough with this distance between us and shifted over so I could hold him. He put his arms around me and started crying again. I just sat there and patted his back, murmuring soothing nonsense words into his ear.

I don't remember how it happened, but suddenly we were kissing. It was a desperate, lonely, greedy kiss, and we fell into it with all the passion we'd been holding back from each other for the last week. Our hands were moving, roaming over each other's bodies, tugging at clothing to find bare skin.

"God, Jack, I've missed this," he moaned as I entered him.

It was quick and dirty, but it slaked our hunger enough so we could scramble through the Hub to my bunker without having an accident of one kind or another because we were too focused on each other to walk straight.

Once in bed it was another story. I kissed him and caressed him and showed him exactly how it could be if we were truly back together. We made love face-to-face, staring into each other's eyes or kissing the whole time. I wanted him to know that I loved him. I wanted him to see it in my eyes as we found our pleasure with each other. I wanted him to open himself to me by opening myself to him as a sign of trust.

Because I _did_ trust him, even if it was only with my heart and not my head, even if it was only with my heart and not the instincts of a soldier and leader that I'd let him wash away with his latent empathy that told me to trust him. My shields were back in place, and my instincts were telling me to watch out. This would be _bad_.

I feigned sleep when he left me in the middle of the night, and counted the minutes and hours until he returned, then the time spent in the Hub that wasn't with me. I smelled a hint of motor oil and antiseptic on his skin, though he'd taken a shower before he returned to bed. He'd made his move, brought something into the Hub, and now it was my turn. I would give him 24 hours to come to me, otherwise I would have to take matters into my own hands. I suspected the safety of the world was in the balance, and my lover or not, _the man I loved _or not, I had to put the planet first. It wouldn't be the first time I'd had to make such a choice, and I doubted it would be the last.

How right I was.

How _wrong_ I was.


	20. Chapter 20

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 20**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: The drama continues in this chapter as we learn a little of what happened between Ianto and Jack 'making up' in the Archives and his betrayal. I have one or two chapters planned after this, then an epilogue. Don't expect all the answers in this story... some things will remain a mystery until the sequel...

And for those who wonder: This is clearly a bit of A/U. Jack mentioned his daughter in passing in chapter 11, and that he had a wife at some point, so Ianto knows a bit more now than he did in the actual TV series. Also, Jack's never been this open with Ianto about being lonely... I like exploring in my stories the '_what if...' what if Jack were more vulnerable? What if they started sleeping together so quickly? etc.  
_

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Ianto had a nightmare that was so bad that it woke both of us, though he calmed down quickly finding himself in my arms. He cried about Lisa, about Cybermen and Daleks, about the Tower falling and UNIT and about betraying me. I doubt he knew what he was saying. I let him talk and told him everything would work out until he fell back into a fitful sleep.

He was subdued in the morning, waking slowly, not eager to leave the small bed where we'd been so closely wrapped around each other we could barely move. If I counted correctly, he'd gotten two hours of sleep after returning from whatever he'd done in the night, then another two after the nightmare. Four hours wasn't that much, though I was working with less than that. I hugged him tightly. _Just tell me, darling, _I thought. _Tell me so we can fix it. Tell me so it won't be as bad a betrayal as you think it will be, because by telling me it makes it slightly better, whatever it is. If I have to find it on my own you lose most of your credibility. You should know that! Please, darling, please tell me. _

I kissed him, bringing him back to the present and out of his dark thoughts, bringing me out of my dark thoughts as well as I could. Sex would help both of us. He wanted to top, but I pushed his hand away when he moved to stretch me.

"Why not?" he asked, confusion making the dark circles under his eyes more prominent in his overly pale skin. He'd lost weight since we last made love in my flat, and I was worried. He was too thin, too worn out. The emotional toll of the last week was wearing him down far too quickly, and our conversation last night hadn't done much to help, since he'd then gone and done whatever it was he did.

I wanted all of this done with soon.

18 hours, I reminded myself. 18 hours for him to come to me before I went down to the basement and figured the rest out on my own. 18 hours before I would have to find out his secret without his input. 18 hours before all trust between us disintegrated under the weight of his lies and cover-ups.

"It takes a lot of trust for me to be willing to bottom," I reminded him. "You'll have to earn it back, after the last week and a half."

"I'm sorry," he said, over and over again as I fucked him. I think he was crying, but I was taking him from behind as he wanted, so I wasn't sure. He probably _was_ crying. That morning it was all about physical pleasure, about fucking, not making love. Neither of us were ready for that again. And, honestly, it wasn't really about pleasure. It was about release, pure and simple.

We showered separately, me in my bunker, he in the communal showers. It gave both of us time to compose ourselves. By the time he brought me coffee in my office, I had everything set to track his movements and Tosh was at her station, a cup of coffee already in her hands that he'd given her on his way past. Owen and Suzie were nowhere to be seen. I'd done my own analysis of the Hub, and I knew which room held his secret. I doubted Tosh would find it, since it wasn't on her usual morning routine to search down there, and middle of the night comings and goings like Ianto had done weren't out of the ordinary enough to raise her suspicions.

"There are a few errands I need to do today," he said as he handed me the coffee. "We need food for Janet and our usual supplier hasn't been working out, so I thought I'd go deal with it in person. I also wanted to take a look at the fish supply for Myfanwy. Would you mind if I took care of that now?"

I took a sip of my coffee as I thought about his request. If I remembered correctly, he'd done this same thing three days ago, though he'd just done it without asking permission, as one of his duties. I decided to pretend I didn't know that little fact. I set down the coffee and stood, walking around the desk to face him. I raised a hand to cup his cheek. He leaned into my hand and closed his eyes, as he usually did when I caressed him like that, so I took the opportunity to kiss him. He put his arms around me, deepening the kiss. Good. I'd missed kissing him like this. It was a more loving kiss than we'd shared that morning, and we both enjoyed it.

He must have forgotten about Tosh, otherwise I doubt he'd have kissed me so freely.

I pressed my free thumb onto the clear 'plastic' sheet I'd left on my desk and gathered the thumbprint-sized oval I needed. I broke the kiss and straightened his tie, leaving the oval on it. Within three seconds it had disappeared into the fabric. Tracking device planted.

"Bring me back some jammy dodgers, OK?" I asked, stroking his cheek and giving him one more kiss. He smiled, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. He was hiding something this morning, and hoping very hard that I didn't notice. I pretended that I didn't. We were both doing a lot of pretending today.

Once he was gone, I waited. Tosh appeared in front of me almost instantly, as I expected.

"Jack, what's going on?" she demanded.

"I'm not sure I follow," I replied, not willing to give away too much.

"You were kissing him! Right here!"

"Ah. We made up last night." I smiled, remembering the lovemaking. "Sort of," I added. "Then he used the opportunity to do something, which I'll have sorted in the next 18 hours."

"Made up?" She settled down on the chair, leaning forward, her curiosity peaked. "And what do you mean by he did something?"

"Watch," I said, activating my laptop. On the screen was a video feed from my tracking device. We watched from the perspective of Ianto's tie as he walked into the tourist office and locked it behind him. We were treated to a view of the Bay. He stood there for a while, not moving much, before turning and going down the street.

"You're seeing what he's seeing?" she clarified.

"Yep. If he does anything dodgy, I'll know it."

"You're just going to sit here and watch what he does all day?"

"Pretty much."

"Now who's being the stalker?"

"We made love last night," I explained. "Then he left my bed, left the Hub, and did something that he doesn't want me to know about while he thought I was asleep. He was back in the Hub for two and a half hours before he came back to bed. I'm giving him another few hours to come to me, now that he's made his move."

She sighed. "He's betraying you."

"Yep. We all knew he would. Now it's about containing it and seeing what's left to salvage afterwards."

In the background, Owen walked into the Hub. He looked around before spotting us. I turned off the video feed before he joined us.

"Jack, Tosh. Hi."

"You're on time today," I commented. "Unusual." He shifted under my stony expression.

"Yeah, well, I thought… I thought I'd talk to Ianto before things got too busy, you know. Apologize. Do the right thing."

"He's not here," I told him.

"Where is he? Isn't he always here by now?"

"Errands," I said curtly. "Talk to him when he gets back, if you want." I paused, considered my next words. I thought of Owen as a son, almost, even if he might not think of me as a father-figure, and I was disappointed. "I expected better from you, Owen."

"I know, Jack. I'm sorry." I nodded. "It's just..." He broke off, looked away. "I'll just — go work on that autopsy," he mumbled, leaving for his station.

Tosh and I sighed at the same time.

"He's hiding something," I grumbled.

"He really does feel bad about it," Tosh said. "He said so last night. We talked for a few hours before he was too drunk to be coherent. He keeps forgetting that Ianto just lost a girlfriend, and being reminded of his own loss..." she trailed off. "He didn't mention Katie, of course, but we both knew what he was talking about."

"I hope Ianto believes him, because right now, I'm not so sure I do." I turned away. "Anything you need to tell me, Tosh? Anything you're hiding?"

"I'm worried about you."

I shrugged. "I'll be fine."

"Anything special you want me to do today?"

"Find a way to put the Hub in lockdown silently. Do it as soon as Ianto's back. My patience is wearing thin, and I doubt I can wait the amount of time I promised myself I'd wait."

She nodded and left me to my stalking, shutting my office door behind her. I turned on the tracker again. Ianto was buying a coffee at the local cafe we all frequented before he showed up and introduced us to real coffee. As I watched, he found a table and sat. He pulled out a leather-bound diary and opened it to a fresh page.

"_I've never wanted to kiss a man more than I wanted to kiss Jack in that moment – so I did,"_ he wrote. I settled down for a long morning of reading over his shoulder.


	21. Chapter 21

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 21**

**by Gracefultree**

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As soon as Ianto re-entered the Hub after his trip to the post office, Owen shouted for coffee. I glanced up from my computer in time to see Suzie's smirk. Ianto glanced in my direction, clearly torn between wanting to talk to me immediately and wanting to make sure everything seemed like normal. I pressed my hands together in a praying gesture, asking for my own coffee and giving him permission to do what he needed to do before we spoke. He nodded. I don't think he suspected that I knew he had an agenda for talking to me, though I couldn't be certain. The man was extremely observant, and I wouldn't put it past him to pick up on some subtlety in my body language to tell him that I knew more than I pretended to.

Watching Ianto's slender, graceful fingers working on the coffee machine from the angle of his tie was a new and intimate experience for me. He worked carefully, placing each mug on his tray in its exact place before adding sugar and cream according to each of our specifications. I wanted to suck the caramel of Tosh's latte off his fingers, but I restrained myself from walking over there. I'm not sure how.

Suzie's smirk at Owen's shout morphed into a mean-spirited sneer when Ianto brought her coffee. I typed in a command to be able to hear what was being said near him. She complained that it was too cold, and why hadn't he been in earlier to make more? Ianto replied softly that he'd been doing errands for me and would bring more coffee after a meeting with me. Via the tracker I could see her look in my direction, her gaze speculative.

"Are you fucking him again?" she demanded suddenly. The camera angle shifted as Ianto stiffened. Before he could answer, she dumped her coffee over his shoes. "Your job _is_ to bend over whenever he wants, I suppose. Go, I'm sure you have _work_ to do." She waved him away. As he turned, I could see the pain in his eyes, though he masked it well with a neutral expression on his face.

Tosh gave Ianto the same tentative smile I'd seen the day before when she was trying to follow my lead and be nicer to him. She even thanked him for the coffee, which made him pause. Her smile was more strained than it had been, but Ianto didn't notice. He was too upset himself, too focused on talking to me later. His posture was rigid, and I knew from reading his diary over his shoulder and the tears splashing down onto just about every page that he was sad and miserable and heartbroken to have to betray me. He was scared, too.

As soon as Ianto turned to bring coffee to Owen, Tosh texted me to let me know that the lockdown was in place and active. I sent back an acknowledgment and watched Ianto's interaction with Owen.

"I'll just leave this here," Ianto said, setting down Owen's coffee on the top step leading down into the autopsy bay. Owen glanced up, pulled off his gloves, and reached for the mug.

"Wait, come down here for a sec," Owen called as Ianto turned his back. I barely heard Ianto's sigh, but I did. He and I waited as Owen hesitated. "I —"

"Look, if you're going to say something embarrassing or mean or demeaning, just spit it out," Ianto grumbled. "I have a meeting with Jack I'd like to get to on time."

Owen snapped his mouth shut, rebuked. His eyes were wide with shock that the normally soft-spoken Welshman who took every insult without responding would talk back to him.

"Well?" Ianto demanded.

"If I knew you were going to be such an asshole about this, I wouldn't even try to apologize," Owen muttered to himself, though both Ianto and I heard it. "But I've been an asshole, too, so shut up and let me say my piece," he growled.

Ianto took a step backwards, and I imagined the look of surprise on his face. Everyone was surprising him this morning, in one way or another. And he had more to come, because much as he thought he knew me, I pride myself on being unique and not responding how others expect me to.

"You —"

"I'm not good with this kind of shit, to listen up, because you'll never hear it again, OK?" Owen continued. "Jack's my friend, and you hurt him a lot. Now, you two seem to have made some kind of truce, or something, so I'm giving you a second chance because of him, but I'm warning you, don't blow it! I went overboard before, and I'm sorry about that, but if you hurt him again, that's nothing compared to what I'm capable of. Got it?"

"Um, —"

"Good, now get out of here. I have work to do." Owen turned his back on Ianto.

"Thank you," Ianto said softly, his voice indicating that he didn't quite believe what he'd just heard. "I'm sorry, too. And I accept your apology." He grabbed the tray with our coffees that he'd set down and retreated up the stairs towards my office. I closed my laptop and put as pleasant an expression on my face as I could manage. By the tenseness of his body language as he handed me my coffee and sat, I could tell that he knew I knew something.

I waited for him to speak. I needed him to do this, to come clean on his own. Yes, I knew he'd done something. Yes, I knew there was something in my basement, and yes, I even knew which room. Yes, I knew he was betraying me. But I also knew that he was conflicted about it. I knew his heart was breaking by being pulled between me and whatever it was he came here to do, which seemed to have something to do with his dead girlfriend.

I needed him to trust me enough to tell me, to believe in me enough that he would confide in me and seek my help. I sipped my coffee.

"I don't know where to begin," he said softly, not meeting my eyes.

"The beginning is usually a good place," I commented, setting down the coffee and leaning back so I could watch every nuance of his body language.

"I'm sorry, Jack," he whispered.

"You said that this morning, over and over. What are you sorry about?"

"I didn't mean to lie. I mean, I did, but I — I wish I hadn't had to. It's eating me up inside, all the lies."

"You've lied to me about something?" I asked, giving him another opportunity to tell me, under the pretenses that I didn't know as much as I did. If he would just tell me…

"I —" he broke off, looked up to meet my eyes. His overflowed with tears. "I love you," he said. "I love you, and I didn't mean to fall for you, and it makes this all so much harder." I waited while he cried, holding my own tears at bay. This was not a time for me to be emotional. "I did something last night."

"When I was sleeping?" He nodded. "What did you do?"

"I brought something into the Hub. A security breach. That's why I needed the job so much. I needed Torchwood's resources, and with Canary Wharf destroyed, you were the only option. You have to understand, I didn't have anywhere else to go!" he said, leaning forward in his desire to get his point across.

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. I pressed a button on my phone, activating the intercom. "Tosh? Please secure the Hub."

"Jack?" she asked, her voice confused.

"You heard me." I clicked off and turned my attention back to Ianto. "Continue."

"I should've just come to you. I know that now, but it's so hard to trust anyone, after what I saw there. UNIT was killing them left to right!"

My outlook shifted. Conversations started shuffling around in my head. His dreams and nightmares… his fears… _Holy shit! _

"What did you bring into the Hub?" I asked, my voice clear and strong, despite the fear that curled in my gut. My instincts were screaming at me to _run, hide, run run run, keep running until the end of time, there's nothing I can do but run. Run! _

"Lisa," he said, more tears streaming down his cheeks.

I was moving even before he finished saying her name.


	22. Chapter 22

**Jack Wakes - Chapter 22**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: This is a longer chapter than usual, in part because it's the last one. There will be an epilogue, followed by a sequel. Yes, I'm writing a sequel! I love this story/concept/AU so much that I couldn't just end it here. I'll make sure I have the title picked out so I can tell it to you when I post the epilogue. Mind you, depending on the reactions to this chapter, you might be able to convince me to add another before the epilogue. It all depends on how much I decide to reveal before the sequel takes over.

Enjoy!

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I vaulted over my desk, shoving Ianto out of the way as I took off in the direction of the basement. "Owen! Medical emergency! Now!" I shouted, not stopping as I passed his station. I heard his cursing fading behind me as I ran. I jumped down a flight of stairs, careened off a wall and took the straightaway as if my life depended on it.

My life _did_ depend on it, for if this were as bad as it could be, if I were caught, I'd spend eternity being tortured. More than my life depended on it, though. The world depended on it. The _universe _depended on it. The heart of the man I loved depended on it, and in that moment, I knew that he was more important to me than the universe, than any number of universes.

Stories filtered through my mind, nightmares from childhood, history lessons in school, videos burned into my skull by the instructors at the Time Agency, images from Canary Wharf. _Cybermen_. Cybernetic beings set on taking over the universe, one planet at a time. They stole the brains out of living people, humans and aliens alike, and implanted them in metal bodies. They removed all emotion and left mercilessness, efficiency and a deadly accuracy when firing their laser weapons.

I remembered a story the Doctor alluded to once, one that wasn't in my textbooks. Well, the incident wasn't remembered _correctly_ in the textbooks, like most things that involved the Doctor. I had to look it up in the TARDIS library when the Doctor wasn't around to find out what really happened.

Sometime in the 26th century, a group of humans and aliens from a number of different planetary systems arranged for a conference on Earth to develop a plan to fight against the Cyberman and keep them from spreading throughout the galaxy. The Doctor, in his fifth regeneration, discovered a small advance army of them trying to destroy the planet while the conference was going on but before any decisions had been made. The Cyber-plan was to take out the leaders of each of the planets, thereby paving the way for the Cybermen to take over in the vacuum of power left after all the leaders were dead.

The Doctor prevented the destruction, though it cost the life of one of his companions and the entire population of dinosaurs on ancient Earth. And here I'd always thought it was a meteor! (I claimed it was a meteor to Ianto when we caught Myfanwy, but that was neither here nor there. Some stories were too difficult to explain in tense situations and doesn't 'a meteor killed the dinosaurs' sound better than 'a spaceship full of dead Cybermen crashed into Earth and killed the dinosaurs?')

All this flitted through my consciousness as I ran down the corridors and stairways of the Hub, Ianto intent on my heels.

I'd never run so fast in my life. Not when I was on an adventure with the Doctor, not when I had dinosaurs chasing me (from _before _the crash), not when the Time Agency was intent on capturing me for what I knew… I couldn't stop and I couldn't slow down.

Somehow, I managed to fit my comms to my ear as I ran. I skidded around another corner.

"Owen, status!" I demanded.

"On my way!" he shouted. I could hear him panting as he ran. "More details would help!"

"I'll tell you when I've got them, right now just follow me. Tosh, Suzie, stay in the main Hub. We'll need you to carry things once we assess the situation. Ianto, where are you?" No answer. "Ianto!"

"He doesn't have his comms," Tosh reported. "He's between you and Owen."

"Direct Owen," I told her, then added another burst of speed.

I took the back staircase just as quickly as the first, flying down three levels before I found the one I wanted. At the end of the hall I could see flashing blue lights in the dusty window of a storage room. A supposedly _unused_ storage room. My anxiety skyrocketed. I added more speed.

The door was locked.

I crashed into it, thinking I'd be able to push it open despite the lock, but the door opened the wrong way and I felt my wrist snap a second before my shoulder took the rest of the impact. (I forgot in my haste that the door was made of reinforced metal, which I wouldn't have been able to push through even if it opened in the proper direction, but that fact only made its way into my mind later.) I reached for my gun, but my arm wasn't working. Dislocated shoulder. Taking a deep breath, I shoved the joint back into place, biting my lip to keep the scream of pain inside. My wrist throbbed, but I'd used a gun with a broken wrist before, and I didn't have time to find the key.

"Jack! Stop!" Ianto's anguished wail behind me startled me, making me miss my first shot, the report of the gunshot echoing loudly in the narrow hallway. I fired again, destroying the lock. I wrenched the door open and froze.

Ianto barreled into me, grabbing me and pinning my arms to my sides, his momentum making us stagger three steps into the room and almost fall. My gun clattered to the floor from nerveless fingers.

"Please don't hurt her," he begged, choking on sobs. "Please, Jack, if you care for me at all —"

It took me barely a second to process that the thing in front of me — no, the _person_ in front of me — was Lisa Hallett, Ianto's girlfriend. She lay strapped into a Cyber-conversion unit, half her body taken over by technology, though her face remained recognizably her own. Owen skidded to a halt beside us.

"Bloody hell," he exclaimed.

I broke free of Ianto's grasp, grabbed Owen by the collar of his shirt and dragged him forward so that our faces were inches apart.

"Get her out of that thing!" I shouted at him, not noticing the spittle that landed on his cheek. "Get her out of there and if you don't do everything in your power to save her, by God I will kill you where you stand!" I threw him in her direction, breathing heavily, anger and terror and pain and sadness waring for a place in my heart.

To his credit, Owen, who had been to London in the aftermath of the Battle of Canary Wharf and had seen Cybermen and people in all states of Cyber-conversion being killed by UNIT without being evaluated beyond having Cyber-technology attached to their bodies, and had then spent several days drunk off his arse over the senseless loss of life, got to work with the professionalism and dedication of one of his best days. This is why I hired him. He could turn off distractions and his own feelings and be the doctor we needed.

I pressed on my comms, then winced as I used my injured wrist on instinct. "Tosh, get us two units of o-neg, two saline drips, two glucose bags, the Bekaran scanner, Owen's crash kit, the emergency surgery kit, and a selection of injectable drugs. Antibiotics, pain meds, everything. Suzie, we'll need a portable oxygen tank, the laser saw, the extraction kit…"

"We can't carry all that!" Tosh interrupted.

"Ianto will help you."

"Copy that," Suzie interjected.

I turned to face Ianto and reached out to lay a hand on his arm, then winced in pain because I'd forgotten the broken wrist yet again.

"What's her name?" Owen asked from the other end of the room where he was shining a light into her eyes.

"Lisa!" Ianto and I answered at the same moment.

Ianto met my eyes and held them. His were wide with surprise and awe. Mine, I knew, were full of compassion and love and sorrow for his pain. We stared at each other for a long time. He took my injured wrist, supporting it in one hand while he undid my cuff links and rolled up my sleeve. Gently, he traced the vein on the inside of my wrist. I shivered at the sensual gesture in the midst of everything else.

"This might hurt," he whispered. Without waiting for me to acknowledge what he said, he quickly realigned the bones of my wrist, neatly putting them back into their proper places, then bent to kiss it. I gritted my teeth through the pain, even while I marveled at his grasp of anatomy.

"I promise you, we will do everything in we can to help her," I said earnestly. "I don't know if we can save her, but we're going to try."

"Thank you," he said, still whispering. Warm tears landed on my forearm.

"Go help the others. I'll stay here with Owen." He hesitated, looking up at my face again. "You're going to have to trust me with her, Ianto. You've told me about her, and now we can do what we need to do for her. This isn't a betrayal," I added, hoping to set his mind at ease about that one thing at the very least. "You did it for love, and while I wish you'd come to me sooner, I understand why you didn't. We _will_ help you. You're not alone. Don't ever think you're alone."

"But —"

"You love her, don't you? And you've come to love me. Well, I love you, too, and I'll learn to love her, for your sake. I'm not suggesting anything kinky. This isn't the time. Just know this: Whatever you want, whatever you need, _I will move mountains for you._"

"Jack…"

"Go, Ianto. My shoulders are strong. Let me carry this burden for a while. You've carried it by yourself long enough."

He surged froward and kissed me hard.

"Go," I repeated, breaking away. I cupped his cheek with the hand attached to my newly-healed wrist. "We'll figure all the emotional stuff out later. We'll talk later. The important thing now is getting her better, if we can."

He nodded, kissed me quickly one more time, and dashed back the way we'd come to help the women with the supplies. I tested the strength of my wrist and walked over to Owen and Lisa.

"She hasn't regained consciousness," Owen reported. "And from what I see here, he's been giving her a lot of pain medication. It's bad, Jack. I need to do a lot of tests, and I'm not sure what kind of prognosis we're looking at."

"Just do what you can," I said, resting my hand on her forehead tenderly. "He knows we might not be able to save her."

"The whole thing reminds me of Katie," he said under his breath.

"I know. I'm sorry. And I shouldn't have yelled at you earlier. I was just so scared, seeing her like this. They're engaged," I continued, hoping the small lie would prompt Owen to work even harder than he ordinarily would. Ianto wouldn't mind, I thought. He'd bought the ring, after all. I'd have to check in with him later about it, though, none the same.

"No, it's good that it reminds me of her," Owen replied, telling me I made the right decision. "If I can save her, maybe I can move on from her death. It's been long enough."

"We can only hope. Ianto's in a lot of pain over this."

"Yeah. I feel even worse for doing what I did. I just — I didn't think I had a choice," he admitted. I listed to the strain in his voice that had nothing to do with Ianto or Lisa.

"Everyone has a choice, Owen," I told him, wondering what else was coming, what other emotional fallout I would have to deal with from members of my team.

"Not if Suzie's watching them."

"Suzie?"

"She's not the person you think she is. I'd look into her personal life, if I were you."

"Warning received," I said, making a mental note to talk to Tosh. "Are you in trouble?"

"No."

I nodded, thinking. "Someone else? Someone close to you?"

"Yes. Don't make me say more, Jack. She'll be here any minute."

"I'll fix it, Owen, whatever it is. Trust me on that."

"I should've trusted you sooner," he muttered. "If you can forgive Ianto this, after knowing him only a month… It gives me hope you'll be able to help me."

"Be strong, Owen. We all make mistakes, and I would be remiss in my job if I didn't help you. More than that, I care about you. I'd like to be your friend." Neither of us said anything as he continued his exam. "We have a few talks to have once all of this is settled. It's time I trusted you and Tosh with something. Several somethings, actually. It just took Ianto's presence to remind me of that."

"We all have to trust each other more, don't we, Jack?" he asked.

"Yeah." I laid a hand on his shoulder comfortingly.

Before I could say anything else, Tosh ran into the room with an armful of medical supplies. She froze in shock, but quickly shook it off and stepped forward. I started setting up an IV pole.

"Do you want to put in the IV or should I?" I asked Owen.

"You do fluids and glucose. I'll do blood and meds over here," Owen answered. He glanced back at Tosh. "Where's the Bekaran scanner?"

"Ianto has it. He and Suzie are right behind me."

Owen nodded to me and handed me a pair of gloves. By the time Suzie came into the room, we'd done all we could do without the scanner. She handed it to Owen.

"I sent Ianto to rest. He was looking gray," she reported. "He could barely stand."

"We're going to have to get her up to the medical bay," Owen said as he examined the results of the scan. "Tosh, Suzie, carry the IV poles. Jack, you help me carry her."

Together the four of us made the slow journey back to the main Hub with our precious burden. Ianto lay sprawled on the ratty sofa, looking like he'd passed out. Once we had Lisa situated, I went over to him and sat on the edge of the couch. I touched his cheek.

"Thank you for telling me, sweetheart," I whispered, leaning over him to kiss his temple. "And I'll keep my promise. We'll do everything we can for her."

Ianto shifted. His eyes opened. "Jack?" he asked sleepily.

"Try to rest. Owen's still examining her. I'll come wake you once we have some news. Do you want to go down to my bunker?"

He considered my offer. "Only if you come with me," he decided.

I shook my head. "I need to be Owen's second set of hands. I was a pretty competent field medic back in the day, and it looks like she'll need it."

"I'm sorry for hiding this."

"I know, darling. I know you are. We'll move through it. I can only imagine how scared you must have been this morning, coming to talk to me."

"I thought you might kill me," he whispered, a tear escaping his eye. I wiped it away with my thumb.

"I will do everything in my power to protect you, Ianto Jones," I promised him. "I will do everything I can to make you happy, even if that means giving you up for her."

"No, Jack, don't say that! We'll make it work, somehow. Don't give up on me, please. I'm not ready to let you go."

I smiled sadly, thinking about how infrequently open relationships worked in this century. "Then we'll play it by ear, all right? I don't want to have to let you go, if I'm being honest." I stroked his cheek again. "Now rest. I'll come get you in a little while."

Obediently, Ianto closed his eyes. I couldn't help but kiss his cheek before I stood to go help Owen. He pulled me in for a real kiss, then let me go with an emotional and breathy 'thank you.'


	23. Chapter 23

**Jack Wakes - Epilogue**

**by Gracefultree**

A/N: Here we are at the last installment of 'Jack Wakes.' Some questions are answered, while others are asked. The next story in the series will be called 'Lisa Wakes.' Look for it in the next week or so.

Meanwhile, thank you for following and reviewing this story! It makes me feel really great to know that I have over 100 reviews for a story that's not even 25 chapters. Thank you all!

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I woke in the autopsy bay in a large puddle of blood, one that was getting bigger even as I struggled to my feet. I felt a tightness in my chest, and there was a scorched patch on my shirt over my heart. I'd been stun-gunned. There were more scorch marks on my shoulder that looked suspiciously like fingerprints. I rotated my shoulder, testing the motion and finding my arm working fine.

Getting my bearings, I realized that the blood wasn't mine, thankfully. I didn't feel like I usually did after dying, so that was something. Lisa's body was still bleeding, the huge gash across her throat the obvious cause of death. But who did it? Why would someone kill her? We were trying to help her! And there was a lot less metal around her limbs than I remembered. Why couldn't I remember?

I staggered up the steps and found Tosh slumped over her workstation, a stun gun-shaped burn mark on the back of her white blouse. On the floor beside her was a tray of spilled coffee and five mugs.

_Where's Ianto?_ I demanded silently of myself._ No, stop. Now is not the time to panic. Think. Assess the situation, then act on it. _

I checked Tosh's pulse. Steady and strong. I looked around. Suzie and Owen were nowhere to be found. I quickly scanned the CCTV records for the past twelve hours. The last thing I remember was going down into the autopsy bay so Owen could brief me on his findings about Lisa before we brought Ianto over. Ianto had been getting coffee for everyone. We'd just shagged, an hour before, on the Hub's couch, while the others were away at lunch, after one of the most intense conversations we'd had to that point.

My blood ran cold at what I saw, and I turned off the playback. Ianto's "betrayal" was nothing compared to this! Even with my up and down emotions of the last few days, I'd forgiven him. He'd done it for love, and that mattered. He'd come to me about it, and that mattered. This, on the other hand, I couldn't forgive. It was murder, plain and simple.

The tracking software told me that Owen and Ianto were in London, though Owen was in the outskirts, driving away from the city, probably on his way back here. Tosh, obviously, was here in the main Hub with me, and Suzie…

Suzie was in my bunker. I charged over, gun drawn, and jumped down the ladder, pulling the hatch closed behind me. She might kill me, but I was blocking the only way out, so I'd get her once I revived. She turned from where she was rifling through my private filing cabinet, looking at me with disdain.

"So, you finally woke up?" she asked.

"I want an explanation," I told her, pointing my gun at her.

She looked at me as if I were the lowest possible form of life on the planet. "You won't get one from me," she replied, raising her own gun. I shot it out of her hand.

"On your knees!" I shouted.

With a smirk, Suzie got to her knees and put her hands on her head. "Bet you loved saying that to Ianto," she hissed. "Too bad you'll never get the opportunity again." I leveled the gun at her. "He'll never remember you," she taunted. "We gave him enough retcon-23 to forget an entire month."

"How dare you!"

"We gave you enough for the last twelve hours, you and Tosh. You'll never get those memories back, Jack. Retcon-23 is powerful stuff. And Owen deleted the CCTV feed, so you'll never know what happened."

"What gives you the right —" I asked, even as I thanked Owen silently for not deleting the CCTV files yet. Clearly, he was trying to defy Suzie, in this small way, in the hopes that I'd be able to do something about it. He must be in deep trouble with her holding something over him to do what he did, but he was trying to do what he could to make things right. Or, at least not as wrong.

"He was a danger to us, Jack. He brought a Cyberman into the Hub! He manipulated you! He even admitted it. You haven't been the same since you met him."

"I've been better," I told her, moving around her to secure her hands. I wondered for a moment why she didn't protest or try to get away, but then I thought that she must have a plan with Owen to get her out of the cell I was about to put her in. Good thing Owen wasn't completely under her thumb. "I've been happy."

"You like to think that."

"It's true," I snarled as I pressed a stun gun against Suzie's neck and discharged it. She slumped to the floor. I holstered my Webly, dropped the stun gun onto my bed. She'd be out for a few hours. After tying her ankles, I stripped and dropped my bloody clothing into the rubbish bin. There was no way it would ever come out, and I was tired of the squishiness of it. I took a quick shower and once I was dressed again, I took Suzie and put her in one of the cells.

Tosh grumbled when I shook her awake.

"Jack? What happened?"

"Suzie and Owen betrayed us. They killed Lisa and retconned Ianto, and both of us."

"What? Why?"

"I don't know about Owen, but Suzie thinks Ianto's a security risk. She doesn't see Lisa as a person, so she killed her. They gave Ianto a month's worth of retcon-23. They gave both of us 12 hours worth."

Tosh's face fell. "A month? That's before he met you!"

"I know." I sighed. "I need you to go to Suzie's flat and search it for contraband tech. Get her laptop. We'll need to see what she has on there. Go through what she's been doing on Mainframe. Get Owen's computer, too, for a similar search. I'll deal with him when he gets back."

"Back from where?"

"I think he was leaving Ianto in his flat in London, but I can't be sure." I called up the tracking software again.

"Are you going to go get him?"

I shook my head sadly. "I need to figure out what happened with Owen and Suzie. The security of Torchwood has priority over my love life. The other day Owen implied that she watches him and that he wouldn't have been so mean to Ianto if she weren't over his shoulder. I wonder what kind of influence she has over him."

"Blackmail?"

"Maybe. I don't know. We'll find out."

"I'll get to work," Tosh said, gathering her pocketbook. She paused and squeezed my arm. "I'll help you get him back, if you want me to," she said. "He was good for you."

"He was," I repeated. "He _is_ good for me," I corrected. "And when I go to London to see the Queen on Monday, I'll stop by and see him. I want him to have a chance to get his feet under him after losing a month of time and memories before I show up on his door claiming to be his lover when in his own mind he's never been with a man before."

"Do you think we can find a way to get his memories back?"

"That depends on Owen's part in all of this. He designed retcon-23, so maybe he can come up with an antidote."

"If Suzie was blackmailing him…"

"He gets a stern talking to and an opportunity to make things right. If she wasn't, it's his turn to take the retcon."

"And Suzie?"

"I have ways of making her talk," I growled threateningly.

Tosh took a deep breath and hesitated before her next question. "What if Ianto doesn't get his memories back? What will you do?"

"I'll go to London and court him. See if the spark is still there. If all he had is his diary, and he wants to know the rest, then I'll give him a summary of what happened here."

"You have to be prepared for him not to remember you, for him not to be willing to get into something with a man."

"I know, Tosh. And it breaks my heart to think of it, but I also have to give him time to mourn Lisa. Even if he decides he wants something with me, he might need that time before he comes back. I hate to think of him not coming back."

"Do you really think you can give him that time?"

"So shrewd, Tosh. Honestly, I'm not sure. I can only hope so." I glanced up at Myfanwy's lair where the pterodactyl was resting. "When you get back from Owen and Suzie's flats, look at the CCTV coverage. Torchwood might be down to just you and me again. That would distract me from missing him, given how active the Rift's been and ow much I'll need to be in the field."

"Why do you have to see the Queen?"

"As the new Director of the entire Torchwood Institute, there are some things that only Yvonne knew that I'll have to learn. And we'll have to talk about compensation for the families of those killed."

"At least the memorial stone got put up so quickly."

"It'll give Ianto something to think about, that's for sure."

"I'll monitor his phone and email and give you regular reports, so you know what's going on?"

"Please. I'm not ready to let him go, but I also need him to come to me, like he did before."

"If it helps, I think he'll come back," she offered, squeezing my arm again. "He loves you, Jack, and I don't think he'll be able to throw that away, even if he can't remember you."

"Are the servers still locked?" I asked suddenly, an idea coming to me. "He'll try to log on, I'm sure. Make sure he can't. And make sure he can't contact us except by coming to Cardiff."

"I've got quite the to-do list going, don't I?" she muttered.

"You and me both. Be back here in two hours, if you can. I should have some preliminary answers from Suzie, and I'll need that info when I talk to Owen. I want you present for that part."

"When you talk to Owen?"

"Yes. I can't trust myself not to kill him, otherwise."

"I'll make it back in time. Don't worry."

I nodded, finally letting her go do what I'd asked of her.

"I promise I'll come for you, Ianto Jones," I said into the air. "And I'll spend the rest of your life loving you, if you'll only have me."

_-fin._


End file.
